Summer of Sharknado
by Mishafied
Summary: Destiel! Gabriel is back - and this time, Dean is the only one who can break Team Free Will out of the deadly cycle of awful SyFy movies that the archangel has them trapped in. Now, if only Dean could figure out just what he had to do to save them, this would be so much easier.
1. Sharknado

It happened so fast that Dean's hands were still in the air, fingers closed on nothing where they had moments ago been holding fabric. The laundry he'd been folding was gone, as was the room around him.

He spun around, trying to overcome the momentary feeling of vertigo at the sudden change. People were walking by him, laughing and chatting, and the smell of salt was heavy on the air; as he looked past the people, he could see why. Over the wooden railing he could see the line of beach extending off into the horizon, the ocean a heavy presence on his left as he started to breathe again. Clouds were churning off to sea, grey and volatile above the dark blue of the water.

"What the hell?" he said, which earned a glare from a woman walking by with a child clutching each arm, the children loudly arguing about what kind of boat ride they wanted to take. He ignored her entirely; he was a little more worried about the fact that he'd been in Kansas five seconds ago than he was worried about offending her delicate sensibilities.

A hand closed on his shoulder, and he jumped and reached for the gun in his waistband that wasn't actually there (because maybe he'd gotten a little lazy about staying armed in the bunker, so sue him). Luckily, he didn't need it- it was Sam behind him, looking just as confused as Dean, pushing his hair away from his face as it whipped wildly in the wind.

"Dean, what happened?" he asked, and Dean let out a half-laugh and shrugged.

"Hell if I know, were you messing with anything in the storage room? Where are we, anyway?"

"I was in the shower," Sam said with a frown, and Dean raised an eyebrow at him, because he definitely didn't look like he'd been in the shower- he was fully clothed, and his hair wasn't even damp. Sam gave him a helpless shrug. "I don't know. I kind of appreciate not being teleported naked, though, so there's that."

Dean snorted. "What do we know of that can teleport us around like this?"

"Angels," a familiar voice said, and Dean turned and sighed with relief when he saw the familiar trench coat and suit as Castiel made his way through the crowd.

"Cas, man, I am glad to see you right now," he said as he took another look around them for anyone familiar. He came up empty; just bait shops, surf shops, restaurants, and a giant ferris wheel, and no one else he knew in the crowd. He turned back to Castiel. "Do you know what's going on? Because if you wanted to take us on a vacation, man, all you had to do was say so."

Castiel narrowed his eyes in that familiar way, like he was trying to decide if Dean was being serious or not. "I don't know why we're here. Or how," he said, and he looked rather annoyed about it, too. "I was in Heaven. Nothing should be able to reach through like that."

"Not even another angel?" Sam asked, and Castiel shook his head.

"No. Not from where I was."

Dean didn't like the sound of that. Something that could reach into Heaven and yank out an angel, and teleport them straight out of the well-protected bunker? It didn't sound like anything he'd ever want to meet. And as much as he liked the beach, the mode of transportation to get there was creeping him the hell out. "Can you zap us back home?" he asked, and Castiel paused for a moment and took a breath.

"No," he finally said, his shoulders slumping the slightest bit. "My grace is bound here. Something about this place is…wrong."

"Well, that's comforting," Dean muttered before he walked over to the wooden railing and peered over. On the beach below, children played in the sand, and…hell, there were a lot of hot women down there. He'd been to a beach before, and normally he found one or two ladies that would really turn his head, the rest being old women in their one pieces and wraps and huge hats.

"Sam, somethin' about this seem strange to you?" he said, and Sam joined him at the railing and looked down at the beach. Dean turned his attention to the men, and while he wouldn't profess to be an expert in what women found attractive in a man, he was pretty sure there was a disproportionate amount of male model types down there.

"What's strange?" Sam asked, and Dean rolled his eyes.

"The girls, Sam. I mean, usually there's at least a couple around that are a two, but…these are all like, eights and tens," Dean pointed out, and he could just feel the look Sam gave him in return.

"Really? We're teleported here by an unknown force and you're concentrating on how the women look?"

"No, come on, that's not…" Dean started, and then he sighed. "Okay, maybe a little, but geez, Sam, just look. This beach is like the waiting room at a plastic surgeon's office on Rodeo Drive. Other than the little kids. But these kids are like, catalog kids, not normal kids."

Sam raised an eyebrow. "You're worried because everyone here is attractive?"

"Dean is right," Castiel said, and Dean couldn't help but give Sam a cocky look as the angel joined them at the railing. "The people here are…different. I don't believe we're in our own universe."

"Something threw us in an alternate universe where all the people are hot? I'm…not really complaining yet," Dean pointed out, and Sam elbowed him, just as there was a scream from the beach below them.

"_Shark_! Get out of the water!" someone yelled, and Dean spotted the problem- a rapidly growing pool of blood in the water a couple dozen feet from shore. People closest to the attack seemed to be taking it seriously, heading for shore, but others blew it off completely, unable to see the blood from where they were swimming.

"Why do I get the feeling that wasn't a random shark attack?" Sam asked, and no sooner had he said it was there another scream cutting through the air. This time they didn't have to look- a man was pulling a woman up onto the beach, one of her legs completely gone, leaving a trail of thick blood behind in the sand.

Sam was already moving, heading for the stairs that led down to beach level, but something caught Dean's eye in the water- shapes, dozens of them, dark smears under the waves. They couldn't be all sharks, he was sure of it- up until he saw one leap from the water and clamp its jaws down on a surfer, dragging him right off his surfboard and into bloody water.

There were other surfers out there, too far to make it to shore- and as Dean leaned farther over the railing, he saw another set of wooden stairs leading down to a jet ski rental dock. He spared one glance at Sam and Castiel, both of them headed to the beach to help the wounded, then he turned and took the other set of stairs two at a time, shoes heavy on the wooden dock as he raced out to the jet skis.

The whole time he told himself over and over that this was a dream. It wasn't real. Sharks didn't hunt by the dozens, they didn't leap from the water to knock people off their surfboards; this was absolutely insane. But everywhere he looked people were being yanked under the water and- really? Was that a shark hauling itself up onto the beach to snap at people?

What kind of universe _was _this?

He ignored the panicked teenager behind the counter of the jet ski rental, hopped onto one of the jet skis, and twisted the key sitting firm in the ignition. The jet ski roared to life underneath him, and he squeezed the handlebars hard, which nearly turned out to be an embarrassing mistake. The jet ski leapt forward, and Dean had to scramble not to get thrown off as it raced away from the dock.

Sharks darted underneath him as he pushed the jet ski to its limits, cresting each wave and dropping into the dip behind it as he looked for someone who needed help. There weren't many left- and it wasn't because they'd left the water. There was too much blood in the water to assume that.

He spotted a man clinging to a surfboard, and he turned the handlebars and headed for him, hoping to get there before a shark did. As he turned, he saw a flash of grey out of the corner of his eye- and barely ducked in time as a shark leapt from the water and soared over the jet ski like a dolphin jumping through a hoop at Sea World.

"Fuck!" he snapped, letting go of the handlebars as he got closer to the surfer. The jet ski slowed, and it never even had a chance to come to a full stop; Dean helped the surfer onto the jet ski, then squeezed the handlebars again, the jet ski lurching forward. Sitting still out here wasn't a good idea and he knew it; hell, even moving didn't seem to guarantee safety.

He wrenched the handlebars back toward shore and gunned it, water spraying up behind the jet ski as he hauled ass toward the beach. Every shadow under the water made him flinch, every fin that cut through the surface another imminent threat, but he managed to dodge them- and he wasn't taking any chances by slowing down when he got to land. He drove the jet ski onto the beach at full speed, sliding to a quick, rough stop in the wet sand. Sam and Castiel knelt nearby, Sam pulling a makeshift cloth tourniquet tighter around the stump where the teenage girl's leg had once been. Dean jumped off the jet ski and ran to them, swallowing past the lump of disgust in his throat at seeing the gruesome scene up close.

For her part, the girl was taking her loss of limb hard- but not physically. She was crying and pale, her sobs making her words hard to understand, but Dean got the idea; she was worried that having a fake leg wouldn't look good.

A shark had bitten off her limb, and she was worried about amputee fashion.

_What. The. Fuck._

"Thanks, man," the surfer he'd rescued said as he jogged up beside him. The man was a bit older than Dean, with brownish-blonde curly hair and a beard. Dean just nodded dumbly at him, because he was still trying to comprehend all this- flying sharks, plus the fact that nobody here seemed to be questioning what was happening.

Castiel spotted Dean and glared, then stood up and stepped away from the distraught girl. "That was reckless," he said, looking at the surfer for only a moment before he was focused on Dean again. "We don't know what to expect here. You shouldn't go off on your own."

"Yes, mom," Dean muttered with a roll of his eyes, and Castiel squinted at him suspiciously.

"I am not your mother."

"No, really? I couldn't tell."

"Guys, not now," Sam snapped, standing up as two medics rushed across the sand. He explained what he'd done so far and stepped back to let them get to work. Thunder rumbled in the distance, and Dean looked down the beach to find it nearly deserted, aside from the injured who were now being tended to.

"Storm's comin' in. Look, I own a bar up on the pier. You're welcome to come up to my place before it hits," the surfer said, and Sam and Dean shared a look- it was probably best to get out of the storm while they considered their next move, anyway.

"Yeah, okay. Sounds good," Sam said with a nod, and the man led the way back to the steps. Dean took one last look at the injured girl, who was trying her best to flirt with one of the medics despite being in agonizing pain, before he followed.

Something was seriously wrong with this universe.

"Name's Fin," the surfer said; he seemed awfully calm considering what they had just been through.

"I'm Sam. This is Castiel, and that's Dean," Sam said, pointing at each in turn. Fin raised an eyebrow at Castiel; the weird name plus the fact that he wore a full suit and trench coat on the beach were probably enough to confuse anyone. Castiel, as usual, was oblivious to the scrutiny.

"Do the sharks always act like that around here?" Dean asked, and Fin gave him a strange look.

"No, man. They're sharks. They don't act like that _anywhere._"

Well, that was comforting, at least. These people may not be reacting to it quite right, but at least it wasn't normal here. If they stayed far enough on land, they'd be fine- a shark could only wiggle its way across land so far before it died. Even alternate reality sharks.

The bar was one of the smaller ones on the pier, built like an oversized wooden shack with gaudy neon lights on the outside. Then again, everything was gaudy on this pier, so it was more status quo than standing out. The inside was just like any other bar Dean had been in before in small town America- aside from the surfboards and fishing poles decorating the walls.

"Fin, did you see all that?" a woman asked from behind the bar, a stocky brunette with tanned skin- and now that she was coming out from behind the bar, Dean could add 'killer curves' to that list. Of course, the second she caught Dean staring, she shot him an annoyed glare.

"Yeah, I saw it. Guys, this here is Nova, one of my bartenders. Nova, this is Sam, Dean, and Castiel. Drinks on the house for them, Dean here saved my ass," Fin explained, and Nova looked Dean's way with new appreciation- or less irritation, anyway, he thought.

"Thanks. I'd hate to be out of a job if he bit it," she joked, and Fin ignored her and walked behind the bar. Another man was sitting at the bar nursing a drink, watching the three of them as Sam and Dean sat down- Castiel, meanwhile, stood by the front window with a frown.

"You guys sure don't look like beach people," the man said, and judging by the 'crocodile hunter' accent, he had to be Australian. He looked like the type of guy Dean loved to hate; all muscles and tan, not to mention the dark hair frosted on the tips with blonde. It was practically the national symbol for 'douchebag'. Nobody frosted their tips since NSync stopped touring. And they shouldn't have then, either.

"We were just planning on walking the pier," Sam said, and the man nodded, and then held out his hand.

"Baz. Friend of Fin's."

Sam shook his hand, then gave Dean a pointed look until he did the same. Outside it was beginning to rain, and the thunder was more constant now, and closer. Dean looked back at Castiel, but the angel was silent, probably still mad at him for going jet skiing through a shark swarm- but it looked like he was concerned, too. Not that he and Sam weren't, but it probably bothered Castiel more, knowing that something had the power to reach into heaven and yank him out.

The only one who'd gotten it over on Castiel like this before was Gabriel, and as far as Dean knew, all the archangels were dead or locked up.

"It doesn't usually storm like this here, does it?" Sam asked Baz, and Baz shook his head, taking a swig of his beer.

"No, mate. Hurricane shot up here from Mexico, nobody can explain it. Storm of the century and all. If it weren't for the crazy sharks, people would still be down there tryin' the waves."

"A hurricane is about to make landfall and everything on the pier is still open?" Dean asked, because from what he knew, when a hurricane rolled in everybody boarded up and toughed it out. Or, if it was bad enough, they boarded up and evacuated. It wasn't business as usual. Baz didn't seem bothered, though.

"Never got a hurricane up here. I guess people are curious," he said as Nova sat three beers down on the bar. Fin stood behind the bar and stared at his cell phone, looking conflicted before he flipped it open and dialed.

"Who are you calling?" Nova asked.

"My ex-wife," Fin replied, and Nova's eyes widened.

"You have an ex-wife?"

Fin waved her off as Dean heard a female voice on the other end of the line. He drank his beer, trying not to seem like he was eavesdropping even though he totally was. Hey, the more they knew about the people in this universe, the better.

He didn't catch all of it, but he got the general idea- Fin wanted to drive up to the hills and pick up his ex-wife and daughter, ex-wife was pissed off about it, she had a new man and didn't need Fin, the usual ex-wife conflicts. Dean tuned it out about halfway through, choosing instead to slide off the barstool and go over to where Castiel stood by the window.

"What are you thinking?" he asked, following Castiel's gaze. It was raining, and grey clouds were churning slowly in the sky, but people here had responded by…getting out their umbrellas. He wondered if the word 'hurricane' meant the same thing here as it did back in their world.

"I'm thinking that there's something strange about this storm."

Dean snorted. "Other than the fact that it was preceded by a pack of sharks with rabies? What do you even call a group of sharks, a school?"

"A shiver."

"What?"

"A group of sharks is called a shiver. And those sharks were not diseased."

"Dude, how do you know that and not know what Bugs Bunny is?"

"I fail to see what a cartoon rabbit has to do with the etymology related to sharks."

Dean was about to answer when a scream from outside turned his attention back to the window. He heard a loud crash farther down the pier, more screaming, and just as he turned to call out to Sam, the windows shattered.

Cold water flooded in and knocked Dean and Castiel off their feet, dragging them back until the bar stopped the water- and then half the wall caved in as a massive shark swept into the bar on another crash of water.

"Shit!" Dean snapped, trying to stand up and get out of the reach of teeth that were probably the size of his hand, and he scrambled out of the way just in time. The shark thrashed and its teeth closed on another customer, blood filling the water again as Dean helped Castiel up onto the bar.

Nova climbed onto the bar with them, gripping a pool cue in her hand, but she didn't look scared- she looked pissed off. She snapped the pool cue in half over her knee, and before Dean could grab for her, she jumped into the knee-deep water and waded toward the shark, pushing floating furniture out of the way.

"Nova!" he yelled, but she didn't turn around- and just as the shark tossed its head toward her, she lifted the pool cue and drove it straight down through the shark's head.

Dean didn't know if he was impressed, or horrified.

"We've got to get out of here!" Sam yelled over the rush of water and the screams from outside, and Dean didn't need any more convincing. They needed to get inland, away from the ocean, and fast, because this shit was insane. Dean jumped into the bloody water, Castiel and Sam close behind; Fin, Baz, and Nova were waiting for them at the door, and hell, Dean wanted Nova on his side, along with the shotgun that Fin had in his hands now.

Outside, though, even Nova stared in disbelief at what was going on.

Wind and waves whipped at the shore violently, and there were specks in the air, but they were only specks till they got thrown closer- sharks. There were dozens, maybe hundreds of sharks being thrown by the wind, and anytime their jaws came within snapping distance of a human, they twisted and chomped down. Dean was sure he was asleep, that this was some kind of insane dream from one too many beers, but the wind battering him definitely felt real. The cold rain felt real.

And it definitely felt real when Castiel yanked him and Sam out of the way just as a shark went flying by and crashed into the destroyed bar.

"Come on!" Fin yelled, taking off toward solid land, and Dean forced himself to follow despite the urge to stand there and stare at the spectacle going on around them. Unfortunately, it was a deadly spectacle, and his first reminder of that was when a shark slammed into the wooden planks beside him and started thrashing. He jumped over it and avoided the teeth by inches.

He heard a loud creaking noise, then a snap that was even louder than the thunder, and he couldn't help but look over his shoulder. At first he was confused, sure that his eyes were playing a trick on him in the wind and rain, but it only took a few seconds to realize what he was actually seeing.

The massive ferris wheel near the end of the pier had broken loose and, like a coin rolling on its edge, was barreling toward them and crushing everything it hit. It shouldn't have been possible, there were a dozen reasons why that just _couldn't_ happen, but he was staring at it.

And there was no way they could get out of the way quick enough.

He skidded to a stop, and Castiel ran into him and gave him a confused and panicked look, Sam barely stopping in time behind them. Dean wasn't looking at either of them, though- he was looking up, pushing both of them backwards towards the ferris wheel as it rolled closer.

"Dean, what are you doing?!" Castiel yelled over the mayhem, but Dean finally stopped them, and then pulled them both down hard. Castiel and Sam dropped to their knees along with Dean just as a gap in the steel beams rolled over them, so close that Dean felt the slight rush of wind off the massive structure as it lifted away.

It had worked for that Aladdin kid in the Disney movie, right? And though Castiel and Sam looked a little pale, both were unhurt. The people beyond them weren't so lucky- Fin, Baz, and Nova had been able to move out of the way, but the wheel was picking up more blood and pieces of building as it rolled, and Dean reminded himself not to look down as they started running toward land again; this time without being chased down by a murderous ferris wheel.

When they got to the end of the pier they were all completely soaked, clothes plastered to skin in the driving, relentless rain. Fin pointed to a nearby SUV, and they followed without question, Baz getting in the front and the three of them getting into the back with Nova. Dean climbed into the second backseat with Castiel, letting Sam sit beside Nova.

"Where are we going?" Nova asked, leaning forward to look out the windshield. Fin had already thrown the car into gear, barely missing panicked pedestrians as he pulled out.

"I'm going to get my wife and daughter. I can drop you guys off somewhere if you don't want to come along," he said, but no one objected. Sam and Dean shared a look; better to stay with the people who had weapons and a vehicle than take their chances on the streets.

Especially now that the streets were flooding.

Dean turned to Castiel, and found the angel looking down with his jaw clenched and a frustrated look on his face. "Hey," Dean said, setting a hand on Castiel's shoulder and speaking low enough that the others couldn't hear him. "Relax. We got this, okay?"

"I should be able to do more. I should be able to break the barrier on my grace, Dean," he said.

"You saved us from being dinner for a flying shark. I think you're doing pretty good without your mojo."

"Guys, look," Sam said, and Dean and Castiel looked up at the flooded streets. At first Dean didn't see anything different- until a fin sliced through the surface of the water beside the car.

"Great. I think I prefer a traffic jam," Dean muttered, stiffening as the car drove into even deeper water. "Hey, I don't think you should go any deeper, this thing'll stall," he said to Fin.

"I've got the engine waterproofed, it's okay," Fin said, and for a moment, Dean wondered if he was joking.

"…Why?" he asked, because waterproofing a vehicle wasn't easy or cheap; usually people had a damn good justification for it. Fin just shrugged.

"I live near the ocean."

"And you planned on driving into it?"

"Dean, knock it off," Sam muttered, and Dean sat back until the car pulled to a stop in front of an overpass. Underneath the low-lying overpass cars were stalled and half flooded, and Dean could see people getting out of the cars, standing in the water- they didn't know about the sharks.

"Fuck," Dean said, opening the door and scrambling out, followed by Sam and Castiel. Evidently they had the same idea, because Sam moved to help a woman out the window of her car, and Castiel watched the water around them for sharks.

"You've gotta get out of here. Leave the car, get out of the water," Dean insisted to a young man in a suit, but the guy stayed beside the car, one hand set possessively on the side of the silver BMW.

"It's just water!" he said, and then he was promptly yanked beneath the water with a scream.

That was enough to get people moving. Fin and Baz were helping one family while Sam and Dean helped the other people. Out of the corner of his eye, Dean saw Cas move toward one of the stalled cars and slam his elbow into the window a few times until it cracked. Dean couldn't figure out why until the window pried free, and a Golden Retriever leaped out and began to swim to safety.

"Baz!" he heard Nova scream, and he turned in time to see Baz pulled away from a car and into the bloody water. Dean made sure the woman he'd helped was in the water too shallow for the sharks before he ran back to Nova, grabbing onto her arm.

"Come on! You can't help him!" he yelled, and she fought at first, but finally gave in and trudged through the water and back to the SUV. Everyone else seemed alright- Castiel had blood running down his arm from a nasty cut to his elbow, though, and Dean reached for it to have a look.

"I'm fine," Castiel insisted, but Dean tore a strip of wet cloth from his plaid shirt and wrapped it tight around the wound.

"Blood in the water is a saying for a reason, you know," he said, though he had to suppress a shudder at the thought of Cas in Baz's place, pulled under by a shark's teeth tearing through flesh and snapping bone-

No. They were not going to die by _flying fucking shark _after they'd stared apocalypse in the face. No fucking way.

Sam called for them and they got back in the SUV, all of them shivering by now from the cold water plus the rain. Dean was relieved when they started driving farther away from the ocean; if the guy's ex-wife had a beach house, no way would they go with them.

Luckily, they didn't run into any more stranded people on the way there, the road winding up the side of the hill in thick trees. Fin pulled onto a narrow, short drive, pulling to a stop near the fancy white house. Even here on the hill, water bubbled out of the nearby sewer drain onto the street and the driveway.

The ex-wife was already out on the steps, and she didn't look happy to see Fin in the least. Dean followed the others out of the car- he figured they might be here a while, watching these two fight it out.

"I told you not to come! Who are these people?! And why do you have a shotgun?!" she shrieked, her bleach blonde hair barely moving from its perfectly straight style, even in the rain. That was some strong hairspray.

"Listen to me, April. There are sharks in the streets. It's all flooded. We need to get Chloe and head inland," Fin said, and April rolled her eyes and laughed.

"You are crazy. You are actually crazy. Sharks in the streets? Really, Fin?"

"We can't fight about this right now. We have to go!"

"I'm not going anywhere, and neither is Chloe! We have Colin now, you know, and he says this is all going to just blow over. And I believe him."

If Dean didn't know God was doing fuck-all right now, he would have thought the guy had a morbid sense of humor- because that moment was the one when a flood of water came rushing out of the sewer, and with it, a good sized shark that knocked the metal grate out of place in the cement. The water pushed the shark right toward Fin and April, and Fin barely got turned around in time to shoot it. April screamed and stumbled back toward the door as more water rushed through the yard and into the pristine swimming pool.

"Come on!" Fin yelled, and Dean made sure Castiel and Sam were with him before he followed them into the house. It was like a fuckin' movie set- all white marble and pristine surfaces, stairs curving up to the left to a landing on the second floor. And on the landing stood a man who Dean could only assume was Colin, and a young blonde girl who was probably Chloe.

"April, are you alright? Who are these people?" Colin asked as he came down the stairs, sending Fin a glare as he wrapped an arm around April.

"Look, we don't have time to deal with your domestic dispute here," Dean snapped before Fin could start fighting with the guy. "The streets are flooded. There are fuckin' sharks in your pool. We need to get the hell out of here."

Colin laughed. "Okay, that's a good one. Really, Fin? You pick now to get your loser friends together for a prank?"

"It's not a prank. You're in serious danger if you stay here," Sam said, trying to be the voice of reason, but reason didn't really work when you're telling people there are sharks in their swimming pool. Colin's jaw worked in fury, and he let go of April and headed for the giant picture window by the door.

"There are no sharks out there. Look! No sharks!" he said as he threw the curtains back, and sure enough, there were no sharks until there totally were- in fact, it was mere seconds before one leapt from the floodwater and crashed through the glass, jaws clamping down on Colin's torso as the water flooded in through the broken window.

The screaming from April and Chloe was enough to nearly render Dean deaf, but he managed to move into action. Sam yanked a heavy wooden bookshelf over to block the bottom of the stairs, and Dean took the shotgun from Fin and unloaded three bullets into the shark's head before it finally stopped moving. The water was so thick with blood that it was impossible to see Colin; or more accurately, what was left of Colin, because nobody bled that much and walked away from it.

"Okay. We need to go, like, now," Sam said, and Fin grabbed April's arm with one hand and Chloe's with the other. Sam pushed the bookshelf a little farther across the floor and led the way, walking along the top of it to stay out of the bloody water on the way to the door. He looked back once he got to the porch, and he didn't even need to say anything- Dean tossed him the shotgun, and he kept watch while everyone else made it out of the house.

"Dad, we need to get Matt!"

Fin frowned. "Matt? Where is he?"

Chloe bit her lip. "Flight school, at Van Nuys."

"He went to flight school? He didn't tell me he was going," Fin said, and Nova snorted.

"Come on. You can bond later, we need to move," she said, and Sam kept the shotgun aimed at the water, watching for any sharks as they piled back into the car. He got in last and pulled the door shut with a relieved sigh.

"How's your elbow?" Dean asked Castiel as the car started to move; the angel had been unusually quiet and moody, probably still beating himself up about not being able to use his powers here.

"It's fine," Castiel said, both of them ignoring the argument going on up front, something about the kids not telling their dad when they did important things. Dean wasn't sure how they could worry about that shit when there were sharks swimming by the car, but he was beyond caring. He wanted to put as much distance between them and the coast as possible.

Turned out that was easier said than done. As soon as they were clear of the trees and on the more exposed roads, the whole situation became a whole lot more complicated; evidently the winds were strong enough that sharks were careening through the air even this far from the ocean, and Dean was so incredibly done with this place that he couldn't even express how done he was.

The car came to a halt, and at first Dean wasn't sure why Fin had stopped again, but then he spotted it- a school bus sitting below and beside the overpass, the floodwaters almost to the top of the wheels.

"There might be kids in there," Fin said, and April laughed in disbelief.

"There probably aren't. They would have gotten out already. Come on, we're wasting time," she said, but she was summarily ignored as everyone else got out of the car. Dean met Fin by the railing and looked down at the bus- it was impossible to tell if anyone was in it from here, but if there was, they weren't going anywhere. Sharks were circling around the bus, like vultures waiting on a dying creature to take its last breath. Of course, that also meant going down there would be suicide.

Sam and Castiel joined them, and Fin frowned down at the bus, and then headed for the SUV. "I have climbing gear in the car. I'm going to check," he said.

"Of course you have climbing gear in your waterproof car," Dean muttered, but no one heard him, because April was back to screeching.

"You are not going down there. Absolutely not. Your daughter is right here, and you want to get yourself killed?" she asked.

"Well, I'm not leaving without making sure there's no one on this bus."

"I'll go," Castiel suddenly said, and Dean turned around and gave him an incredulous look.

"Are you crazy, Cas? You don't know how to use that stuff," he said, but Castiel was already at Fin's side.

"You need to stay here with your daughter. Dean, you can stay up here and shoot the sharks that get too close. Just tell me what to do," Castiel said, and Fin considered it for a few long moments before he nodded.

"Alright. If you're sure," he said, and he started to strap Castiel in the harness and explain all the details about friction brakes and ascenders. Dean felt ill; he didn't want Castiel doing this. Fin, okay, or himself, but not Cas. As Castiel headed for the railing, Dean caught him by the arm.

"You really sure about this?" he asked, and Castiel's gaze was unwavering as he nodded firmly.

"Yes. Just…cover me, as you say," he said, stopping to wait as Fin got the ropes hooked up to the railing of the overpass. Castiel climbed to the other side, adjusted his hands on the friction brakes, and then pushed off.

Dean kept the shotgun at the ready, staring at the dark shapes around the bus as Castiel dropped toward the water. He finally got to the level of the bus, reached out, and grabbed the handle on the emergency exit door, swinging it open.

"It's okay. I'm here to help," Dean heard him say as he stepped into the back of the bus, and Dean let out a sigh of relief, both that he'd gotten down safely and that these kids hadn't been left stranded in the rising waters. There was a pause, and then Castiel appeared at the door again, a girl clinging to him like a koala to a tree. She was young, probably not older than ten, and she looked pale and terrified.

Castiel talked to her the whole way up, his feet working the ascenders one at a time until he reached the railing again. He helped the girl over and into Nova and Fin's arms, and they passed her off to Sam so he could move her to a safe dry place out of the way. April was on the phone with an emergency dispatcher, hopefully getting people out here quick to help these kids.

"How many are down there?" Dean asked Castiel before he could drop back down.

"Fourteen children and the driver."

Dean took in a sharp breath. "The water's rising too fast, you won't get them all."

"Well I certainly won't if I stand here conversing with you," Castiel said with a tired smile before pushing back from the railing. This time his descent was much faster as he adjusted to using the friction brakes, and in mere seconds he was picking up another child from the back of the bus, making sure the kid had a good grip on his harness before he started up again.

It was slow work, and with every child the water rose more and the rope began to fray where it lay against bottom of the concrete railing- because of course they make rock climbing ropes in this universe that can't actually be used on rock, imagine that- and by the time there were only two children and the driver left, water was beginning to cover the floor of the bus. Castiel took the time to help all three of them climb to the roof of the bus to buy more time, the rope fraying more and more with each trip.

"Cas, you've gotta hurry!" Dean called down, and Castiel grabbed onto the second to last kid, his arms shaking now with effort as he climbed back up. The last child made it over the railing just as a couple of ambulances pulled up to where the kids were huddled together waiting.

There was no way that Castiel could bring the bus driver up. Dean's grip tightened on the gun as he saw Castiel unstrap himself and step out of the harness, showing the bus driver where to put his feet and how to use the ascenders. Dean clenched his jaw, though he knew it wasn't fair to be mad at Castiel or the driver- there would be no other way to get him to safety.

It seemed to take forever, and with the bus driver being at least twice as heavy as Castiel, the rope was on its last legs. The bus driver finally scrambled over the railing, Fin, Nova, and Sam all helping him onto solid ground. Dean grabbed the harness as soon as it was free and tossed it down to Castiel.

"Come on, Cas!" he said, because the sharks beginning to get braver, swimming closer to the bus and sticking their heads out of the water like a fucking whale spy hopping. These were some fucking mutant sharks, he would swear to it, jumping around like dolphins and shit.

Castiel didn't bother with the harness; he just got his feet into the ascenders and grabbed onto the friction brakes, starting upward as fast as he could. He'd barely made it a few feet when a shark leapt from the water, its jaws closing on the end of the rope hanging below Castiel, and Dean cursed- Castiel was too low, he couldn't get a clean shot on the shark. The rope was about to snap, and Castiel only glanced down before continuing the climb.

The shark lunged upward and snapped its jaws down on the rope again, climbing higher on the rope.

What the actual fuck.

"Faster!" Dean yelled, his stomach twisting into knots as he aimed, trying to get a shot at the shark that wouldn't risk Castiel. The rope frayed one more time, it was almost gone, and he couldn't wait any longer.

As the shark did another tooth-crawl up the rope, Dean pulled the trigger.

The shark dropped into the water in a spray of gore, and Castiel flinched before moving his feet again, and Dean was already reaching for him because that rope was going to snap. He lunged over the railing and grabbed Castiel's outstretched hand just as the rope finally gave out, and the concrete railing pressed into his stomach painfully hard as he felt hands grab onto his ankles to keep him from going over the edge.

"Don't let go," Dean choked out, because he remembered this, remembered clinging desperately to Castiel's hand and begging him not to let go, and he'd lost him. He wouldn't let it happen again. Castiel's other hand reached up to grab his wrist, and Dean wriggled backward on the railing until Sam and Fin could grab his shoulders and haul him up, all three of them pulling Castiel over the railing. He collapsed onto the ground, breathless and shaking with exertion, but when he looked over at the kids he managed a slight smile.

"Never do that again," Dean snapped, and Castiel gave him a confused look.

"Okay," he answered nonetheless, and then the wind picked up with a vengeance, because one death-defying feat wasn't enough for them right now, evidently. Debris began to whip by them, then larger debris, and fuck, that wasn't debris, that was a fucking Volkswagen that just got thrown into their SUV. Dean dragged Castiel down flat on the ground as the wind screamed by them and a shark ricocheted off the railing right behind them.

It seemed like forever, but it was probably more like thirty seconds before the wind finally began to die down. Dean finally lifted his head, pausing for a few seconds before climbing to his feet and helping Castiel up. He held his breath until he spotted Sam, still safe and unhurt, and then he let out a sigh of relief.

"God damn," Dean heard someone say, and it was the bus driver, climbing to his feet and brushing the dirt off his khaki shorts. "Mom always said Hollywood would kill me!"

A flash of white and a deafening crash later, and where the driver had been standing, a giant white 'H' was speared into the road. The fucking H from the fucking Hollywood sign.

"I am so fucking done with this place," Dean said, and he once again pinched himself roughly to make absolutely certain that he wasn't having some crazy alcohol induced dream. Things like this didn't happen. They just didn't.

"Oh my god," Sam said from behind him, and when Dean looked up, he actually wasn't surprised. He really wasn't.

A tornado was tearing through the city, and even from here he could see the flashes of silver as sharks twisted through the air around the tornado. A shark tornado. This could not get any more ridiculous. It literally couldn't. It was impossible for this to get any more ridiculous than it already was. He was looking at a fucking sharknado.

"Well, what now?" Nova said, glaring at the spot on the pavement where the SUV had been parked before it got bitchslapped by a projectile Volkswagen.

"We'll find another car," Fin said, already starting to walk, and one by one, they followed. April ran to catch up with him, trying to slow him down.

"Find another car? You want to steal a car?"

"Lady, I think car theft is the last thing people are worried about right now," Dean pointed out, but she ignored him, still whining to her ex husband. Fin, though, had zeroed in on a car already, sitting in a nearby lot- and Dean blinked. It was a huge black Humvee, tricked out with rims and all the bells and whistles. He whistled low as Fin opened the door and looked inside.

"Any of you know how to hotwire a car?" he asked, and Dean smirked and stepped forward to climb into the Humvee and set to work. In less than thirty seconds the engine roared to life and he hopped out, ignoring the accusatory look from April.

"Thanks," Fin said, climbing into the driver's seat, and Dean made sure Sam and Castiel got in the Humvee before he followed suit. Dean looked out the back window as they pulled away, the tornado of sharks still grinding away through the city, like it had some kind of grudge against Los Angeles.

"Shit," he heard Fin say, and he turned around to find a police blockade ahead of them.

"Is there any other way to the school?" Chloe asked, and Dean knew the answer before Fin said it. Of course there wasn't. In this universe, nothing was that simple.

"Just tell them where you're going, I'm sure they-" Sam started, but he was cut off by the car jerking forward, and the next thing Dean knew they were crashing through the wooden road blocks. A police car flipped on its lights and gave chase, and the look Sam gave Fin was absolutely priceless.

"Was that really necessary?"

"Can't afford to wait," Fin said, and Dean smacked his hand on the window as they skidded around a corner, the police car close behind. At least until a massive shark was thrown into the side of the cruiser, and it flipped away, the siren warping strangely before dying out.

"Well. That was handy," Dean muttered, and Castiel gave him a look. Dean shrugged; it wasn't like he threw the shark at the car. It was just good timing.

It wasn't long before the Humvee was pulling to a stop by a huge open hangar and a line of helicopters sitting on helipads outside. One of the tornados was way too close for comfort, and they ran for the building, where two men met them just inside the hangar doors.

"Mom, Dad! What are you doing here?" the younger man asked, and Dean was tempted to make a snide remark about them just dropping by for a tea party, but he managed to restrain himself. Especially since the sound of the tornado was growing louder.

"Take cover!" Castiel said, backing away from the open hangar door, but it was too late for the older pilot- as they moved to take cover he was sucked out of the building like a giant vacuum hose was sitting outside the door. The rest of them managed to take cover in time, hunkering down behind tables as the tornado seemed to pull away and miss hitting the building directly.

Dean stood up to find sharks thrashing on the ground outside, one flopping its way toward the hangar door. He couldn't even begin to count how many sharks he'd seen today- thousands? Millions? It didn't seem like there would even be that many sharks in the entire Pacific Ocean.

"We have to do something," Matt said, and Dean just stared at him for a moment.

"…What do you propose we do against tornados full of sharks?"

Matt didn't seem to realize that Dean didn't actually intend that as a serious question. Dean's idea of dealing with this was to get in the Humvee and hightail it out of town, but evidently that wasn't on the agenda for these crazy people.

"Aren't they supposed to be taking shelter?" Castiel asked, and Dean followed his gaze to the nursing home across the street. In the glass breezeway of the building, it seemed like every old person had parked their wheelchair or walker to watch the tornadoes, like it was the fucking Sunday matinee at the theater.

Even a full 80 years of life didn't seem to have any noticeable beneficial effect on the intellect of these people. It was hopeless.

"We have to stop those tornadoes before they come back here. All those people will die," Fin pointed out, and Dean wanted to scream.

"Okay, first of all, tornadoes don't get 'stopped'. And two, I would say that those people are shining examples of Darwinism if they weren't all past the expiration date on breeding," Dean snapped, but they didn't seem worried about his concerns. Instead, Matt was gathering up something from under the counter, and when Dean saw what it was, he just stared in disbelief.

"Are you _fucking_ kidding me? Why do you have dynamite at a flight school?"

Matt frowned. "Why wouldn't we?"

"Oh, sorry. Yeah, why wouldn't you? Totally normal. I keep dynamite under the sink in my bathroom," Dean said, and Sam grabbed him by the shoulders and made him look him in the eye.

"Breathe, Dean. Breathe," he said, and Dean nodded, taking in a deep breath and letting it out. Sam squeezed his shoulders. "Remember, this place runs on different logic. Flying sharks and all."

"He's correct. The normal rules of physics are skewed here," Castiel agreed, watching as Matt strapped some dynamite together and tied it to a timer.

"If we can disrupt the air flow and equalize the pressure in the tornadoes, we can probably make them dissipate. We can take bombs up in the helicopter and throw them in right at the top," he said, and even Sam boggled at that.

"It's not safe to fly in this," he said. Matt blinked and looked confused.

"As long as we stay out of the tornadoes, we should be okay. I'm top of my class."

"Of course you are," Dean muttered as Fin and Nova moved in to help Matt build more of the bombs. Dean wasn't having any part of that. He drew the line at 'building bombs to throw into a tornado full of fucking sharks'.

"Someone will need to go up with me in the helicopter to throw the bombs," Matt pointed out, and Nova shrugged.

"I'll go."

"Hell no," Dean snapped, because he could just see how that would end up. He wasn't letting her stroll into a helicopter to go fly around some tornadoes. She was one of the sanest people here, though that wasn't saying much.

"Well, unless you're going…" Nova said, raising an eyebrow, and Dean swallowed hard and shrugged.

"Fine. I'll go," he said, earning a horrified "_What_?" from both Sam and Castiel.

"Dean, you can't," Sam said, and Dean laughed.

"Different physics, remember? We'll probably be safer than you guys stuck on the ground," he bluffed, the roar of a tornado getting louder. There wasn't any more time to argue- that tornado was close, and this time it might not be a glancing blow.

"Alright, they're ready. We've got four," Fin announced, and Matt handed one to Sam.

"Here, keep one on the ground, just in case. We'll take the other three up. Ready?" he said to Dean, and Dean nodded, already second-guessing his split second decision to get in that chopper instead of Nova. No going back now, though.

He started to follow Matt, but a hand closed around his wrist with an iron grip, and he turned to find Castiel holding him back. The angel's blue eyes locked on his, equal amounts of anger and fear showing.

"You are _not_ allowed to die doing something this stupid," he said, his voice low, and Dean chuckled.

"I don't plan on it. Don't worry, I got this. I've always wanted to bomb a tornado full of sharks," he joked, and Castiel just looked confused as Dean turned and jogged after Matt. Matt climbed in and put the bombs down by where Dean would be sitting, and Dean got in after, looking back in time to see weapons getting passed out between the rest of them. Sam was checking to make sure his gun was loaded, and Nova was showing Castiel how to turn on a chainsaw.

A fucking chainsaw. Angel of the lord, and patron saint of chainsaw combat.

The helicopter blades were slicing through the air so fast he couldn't even see them when the helicopter lifted off the ground, and Dean fought down a wave of panic as the ground retreated faster and faster. Instead, he grabbed one of the bombs and got ready to set the timer, because once they were airborne, they were only moments away from the first tornado.

"Are you ready?" Matt said, and Dean nodded. Matt turned the chopper toward the tornado, the wind thrashing at them and making Dean's eyes sting.

He set the timer for five seconds, then gave it the best throw he could manage.

The bomb flew into the wall of debris and dirt filled wind, and Dean counted down to the inevitable blast, which was big enough that he felt the wave of heat even from where the helicopter hovered. After a few seconds, the tornado began to break up, sharks falling from the sky like hailstones with teeth.

It worked. It actually fucking worked.

Matt cheered and turned the helicopter toward the next tornado, farther into the city. They followed the same steps, and once again, moments after the blast the tornado started to break apart. Dean knew that this shouldn't be working, it was the stupidest thing he'd probably ever done in his life, but it was working.

Matt circled to find the third tornado, and kicked the speed up a notch when they saw that it was headed right for the hangar.

Dean grabbed the third bomb and started getting it ready, and scooted toward the open helicopter door when they got closer to the tornado- but the whole helicopter suddenly yanked to the right. A shark was clinging to the skid, sending the helicopter into a spin, and Dean couldn't hold on. His hands slipped on the metal of the helicopter as he fell into open air, and the last thing he remembered seeing was the gaping maw of a massive shark.

On the ground, Castiel tried to spread his invisible wings the moment he saw the helicopter start to go down and Dean fall out- but his wings hit that barrier, the muscles cramped and feathers twisted from being bound. He didn't look away from that shark, though, even as Sam grabbed the extra bomb and ran for the Humvee.

Sam jumped into the Humvee and left the driver's door open as he jammed the pedal down, glancing between the base of the tornado and the timer on the bomb as he drove. When the winds started to get too violent, he took a deep breath, set the timer, dropped the bomb on the passenger's seat- then leapt from the open door and hit the ground rolling, pain firing through his shoulder as he hit.

Moments later he heard the bomb go off, and he finally lifted his head to see the tornado break up, flinging the sharks in all directions. One fell right toward him, and he rolled to the side just in time to avoid getting squashed by a hammerhead shark, its dead, black eyes staring at him as it twitched and snapped. He got to his feet and began running back to the hangar, because he had to get to Castiel, they had to do _something_- Dean wasn't gone. He couldn't be gone.

Castiel still had his eyes locked on the shark that had swallowed Dean whole, and as it fell, he moved to intercept and did the first thing he could think of to do. As it thrashed toward the ground he fired up the chainsaw and swung it, tearing a gash up the shark's chest and belly right before it smashed into the ground. Throwing the chainsaw aside, Castiel dropped to his knees and shoved his hands into the shark's belly, feeling around until his hands closed on something that was decidedly not viscera.

He dragged Dean out of the shark, and the hunter was already coughing and sputtering, spitting shark innards onto the ground as Sam reached them. Sam had to take a moment to cover his mouth and gather himself, because he'd seen some gross things, but this was a whole new level of gross. Dean was covered in blood and shark bits from head to toe.

"It ate me," Dean choked out, his voice rough. "That thing fuckin' ate me, it…did you seriously chainsaw a shark open?"

Castiel shrugged. "It seemed like the best course of action at the time."

"You could have chainsawed _me_!"

"Please, I have better aim than that."

Castiel reached down and took Dean's hands to help him up, but the moment he pulled Dean to his feet, the world around them froze. Everything just stopped- the people, the flailing sharks, even the wind died down to nearly nothing. Dean tried to wipe the rest of the shark blood and guts from his face (which seemed to be a futile effort) as he stared at a frozen Fin hugging Chloe.

Someone started a slow clap.

They turned around to find Gabriel standing among the chaos, a smirk on his face as he walked toward them and surveyed the damage as he went. Dean was sure his jaw was on the ground, because Gabriel couldn't be here, Gabriel was _dead_; he'd seen the charcoal smear of wings on the ground himself.

"Good job. Glad to see you learned to play along," the archangel said, and Dean could tell that Castiel was barely restraining himself from going after Gabriel, powers or no powers.

"You're dead," Dean said, not a threat, just an astute observation because Gabriel had been totally, completely dead. For sure.

"Correction. _Was_ dead. Living impaired, if you want to be PC about it. But that doesn't matter."

"How in heaven's name does that not matter?" Castiel asked, the words coming out nearly a growl. Gabriel smiled and kicked aside a chunk of dead shark.

"Because this isn't about me, it's about Dean!" he said, and Dean felt his stomach twist, because the last time this douche decided to have an extended visit, Sam got the Groundhog Day treatment. Dean saw Castiel's fists clench, and he got ready to hold him back if need be, because attacking an archangel on their turf wouldn't end well.

"We've had enough of your games, Gabriel," Sam said, and Gabriel rolled his eyes.

"Believe me, Sam, I'm doing you a favor in particular. And this time you're just along for the ride. Moral support, so to speak. It's Dean's game this time," Gabriel said, and Dean saw that familiar look in his eyes, the one he got when he was so proud of his little games he set up. "Dean, Dean, Dean. You're the one in control here. You can break this loop in half a second."

Dean laughed. "And I'll bet you're not gonna tell me how, are you?"

"How much fun would it be if I gave it all away? Besides, I have so much more planned for you. Enough strange monsters and crazy weather to keep you looped up here for years, if that's how long it takes."

Castiel actually did start forward at that, and Dean grabbed onto his arm, stopping him before he did something really stupid- as much as he hated to admit it, right now they were at Gabriel's mercy. Gabriel watched, giving Dean a long look before looking back at Castiel.

"Sorry, bro. Had to bring you along or this just wouldn't work. Besides, you like spending quality time with the Winchesters, don't you?"

Castiel's fists were clenched so tight that his knuckles were paper-white. "This is childish, Gabriel. Send us back," he said, and Gabriel chuckled.

"You'll all be thanking me once this is over. Now, I'd love to stick around and chat, but while you're in here I'm going to do some house cleaning. The roaches invaded while I was gone," he said, caramel colored eyes focusing on Dean once again. "It's all on you, Dean. Dig deep. I'm tellin' you, if you catch on quick, you'll all be out of here in, oh…three movies? Four? But there are plenty more in my personally created Netflix queue, and I can't guarantee that getting eaten or dismembered here won't, you know, carry over, so I'd suggest you pay attention."

Castiel pulled against Dean's grip, still trying to go after Gabriel when the archangel snapped his fingers. All at once the world seemed to spin around them, a blurred mess turning to black.


	2. Titanic II

When the world finally stopped spinning, Dean was staring at the ocean.

He was no longer covered in slimy, smelly shark innards, which was a plus, but he wasn't wearing the same clothes, either- he was in a tuxedo. A full on, well-fitting tuxedo, complete with a bow tie. It felt constricting and uncomfortable, and it was little protection against the biting cold of the air around them. He felt ridiculous.

Sam and Castiel were in much the same situation, and it made Dean do a double take, seeing Castiel in something other than the familiar suit and trench coat, and in clothes that actually fit him. It took him a moment to pull his attention from that to see where they were- which, now that he was looking, seemed familiar.

"This is a really big ship," he said, looking down the side of the ship, the deck stretching on and on seemingly forever.

"It has smokestacks," Sam pointed out with a frown, and Dean got that familiar feeling again, like he'd seen this before, somewhere. Castiel looked confused too, looking to the front of the ship as he wrapped his arms tighter around himself, trying to fight off the cold that he likely wasn't used to feeling.

"Did we get thrown back in time or something? Ships don't do smokestacks anymore," Dean said, but his question was answered without words when two women walked out onto the deck, wearing miniskirts and holding champagne glasses.

"Okay, yeah, definitely present day," he said, watching as Sam made his way to the railing and looked down and over. And Sam usually wasn't one to curse, so when his response to what he saw was to snap "fuck!", Dean went to the railing.

"What?" he asked, and Sam straightened up with a sigh.

"Look at the name of the ship, Dean," he said, and Dean leaned over and looked down- conveniently, Gabriel had dropped them right above where the name of the ship was emblazoned on the side, and it clearly said 'Titanic II'.

Well, fuck.

"Well, at least we know how this one ends," Dean muttered, running his fingers through his hair. It was, what, 50-some degrees out here? That water was probably freezing.

Castiel had followed their lead and looked over the side to read the name of the ship, and now he was frowning even deeper than before, brow furrowed in thought. Dean was struck with the sudden realization that the last time Castiel had anything to do with the Titanic, he was having Balthazar save it from sinking; not exactly great memories.

Then again, maybe they should have left it saved. Then they probably wouldn't be standing on a doomed ship.

"Well, they've got to have enough lifeboats this time. Regulations and all," Sam pointed out, though Dean wasn't so sure.

"It's never that easy," he muttered, just as a man came strolling down the deck toward them with a scantily clad woman clinging to each arm. It was like a textbook picture of a stereotypical rich douche; a guy in a tux who looked like he'd had one too many botox injections, and women clinging to him like he was made of money.

"Sam, Dean, Cas! How are my favorite buddies?" the man said with a grin, and Dean blinked and shared a glance with Sam. They didn't know this guy; he would definitely remember.

"We're, uh…we're good," Sam said, fumbling for the words.

"Good. Enjoying my ship? How come you aren't at the party?" the man asked, the girls still doting on him in a way that was downright creepy.

"Oh, yeah, great ship. We were just talking about the lifeboats," Dean said, and Sam snorted and gave him a look.

"We'll head to the party in a minute. We're getting some fresh air," Sam explained, and that seemed to appease the guy for now.

"Come on, Hayden, it's cold," one of the girls pleaded, tugging at 'Hayden's' sleeve like a kid wanting attention from her mom. It was kind of pitiful, and honestly, Dean had to bite back a remark about how it might be warmer if she was actually wearing more than a scrap of fabric. Hayden rolled his eyes and gave them a shrug.

"Duty calls. Listen, go have some drinks. No sense in standing out here talking about lifeboats when we'll only be using the things as decoration," the guy said, giving them a big smile before leading the girls toward the door.

"Well, even if the ship wasn't going to sink already, he just jinxed it," Dean said, and Castiel turned to Dean, his expression uncertain.

"What are we going to do?" he asked, and Dean took in a deep breath. They would probably hit an iceberg, right? That was what the last Titanic did. No reason to think it would suddenly switch up. He knew it wouldn't be as simple as just hopping in a lifeboat, but honestly, how fast could a ship this size really sink?

"We can't get off the ship by ourselves," Sam said, his eyes focused on the rigs and pulleys holding the lifeboats in place. "Even if we could, we'd be stranded out here."

"Looks like we're just waiting," Dean said, the reluctance clear in his voice, because the last thing he wanted to do was sit around on a ship that they knew would end up sinking. The occasional scene from the movie popped into his mind of people falling down the ship, struggling in the icy water; but really, the only scene that really stuck with him was the one with Kate Winslet's tits.

…Hey, she had a great body, could you really blame him?

"I…don't think I can swim," Castiel said, and Dean raised an eyebrow at him.

"Sorry, what? You don't know how to _swim_?"

"I never had to," Castiel snapped as he shifted his weight uncomfortably and glanced out at the dark water. "Angels can fly through water as easily as air. I've never _had_ to swim."

"Don't worry. They have lifeboats, so we shouldn't end up in the water anyway," Sam said before either of them could say anything more. "Let's go inside. Maybe if we stick close to Hayden we'll overhear something useful. Ice warnings, I don't know."

It was as good a plan as any, given the situation. Dean nodded and glanced at Castiel before he followed Sam to the door, the heat of the hallway welcome after the biting cold wind of the outside air.

It was definitely a good replica of the original ship. Dean wasn't a history buff or anything, but he remembered the hallways in the movie looking like this, at least. And it wasn't hard to find the party; they could hear the bass thumping from farther down the hall, and they just followed the noise till the hallway opened up into a larger room. This one was evidently not history-accurate; Dean was fairly sure the Titanic didn't have a stage with strobe lights and giant speakers blasting some ridiculous pop music.

That, and he was pretty certain the women on the Titanic didn't wear skintight dresses and miniskirts.

"Not sure how we're going to overhear anything in here," he said to Sam, having to talk loudly in order to be heard over the music. Sam just frowned, looking over the top of the crowd to try and spot Hayden, but it was Castiel who finally spoke up.

"Over there," he said with a nod toward the far end of the room, where Hayden was standing with a small crowd of people. Most of them were staring at the guy like he hung the moon.

"Don't any of these people feel like this whole trip is jinxed?" Dean asked, wondering just how many of these partiers were going to be alive at the end of the night.

"Dean, if they paid to be on this ship, I doubt they were among the naysayers," Sam pointed out, leading the way through the crowd toward where Hayden stood.

Unfortunately, they didn't get to hear a thing.

The moment they got close enough to hear him over the music, the whole room jerked violently, not just throwing people to the ground- no, it didn't stop there, and Dean was on the floor and trying desperately to stay put, because the whole room was tilting drastically.

Someone slid into him with a scream, and he felt her heel cut into his shoulder as they both went tumbling into the wall, which wasn't a long fall for him, luckily. Other people hit the wall above them, people who'd been on the other side of the room and hit furniture on the way down.

The music warbled and then went silent, and all Dean could hear were screams and the groan of the ship around him. All he could think of was to keep his head covered in case anything else fell on him, and his mind was yelling that this was Poseidon, that the ship was just going to flip upside down and they'd all drown trapped in here.

The ship finally began to right itself, the room shifting from an almost vertical angle and back to a flat surface, dropping people to the floor as the wall once again became the vertical surface in the room. Dean felt sick, like his stomach had been twisted into knots, and he uncovered his head and immediately looked for Castiel and Sam, ignoring the pain in his shoulder that came with each movement.

Damn stilettos.

"Cas? Sam?!" he shouted over the moans and sobbing of the injured people around him, and as he sat up he saw Castiel to his left. The angel looked alright, but obviously a little dazed, and a nasty cut on his forehead left blood dripping down the side of his face.

"Cas, buddy, you okay?" he asked, crawling over to him and helping him sit up. Castiel nodded and pressed his hand to his forehead with a wince. Dean heard his name, and he looked over his shoulder to find Sam standing behind him, looking just as relieved as Dean was to see each other alive. Banged up, but alive.

"What the hell was that?" Dean asked, looking around at the destruction- a good amount of the furniture had been attached to the floor, or this would have been an absolute bloodbath. As it was, people were nursing wounds from falling, and being hit by falling chairs, and there were at least a few who were definitely dead.

"Felt like a tsunami," Sam said, and Dean gave him a look.

"We're in the middle of the ocean. Tsunamis don't…_work_ out here."

"Rogue waves, Dean. It happens. Not often, but it does. And we both know Gabriel's little storylines don't exactly match up with reality, unless you know of anytime when tornadoes full of sharks have hit a city."

Okay, one point for Sam, because he was right. Even if tsunamis couldn't happen in the open ocean, Gabriel would make one happen for his own entertainment.

Dean helped Castiel to his feet, and made sure he was steady before he let go. Castiel hadn't been quite right since they got here, since he saw the ocean, and Dean couldn't blame him; knowing that you were on a soon to be sinking ship and not confident in your ability to swim? That was shitty beyond belief.

"We got word from the WMO," Dean heard someone saying, and he spotted Hayden not far away, looking disheveled but unhurt. The man talking to him was wearing a uniform that was splattered with blood. "That was just the first wave."

Dean, Sam, and Castiel moved closer, going unnoticed by Hayden and the other man, who were too wrapped up in their conversation to notice. Hayden, for one, looked an equal mix of panicked and furious. "What do you mean, the first wave?" Hayden asked with a glare that had the other man practically shrinking.

"There's another wave coming. A bigger one. A whole ice shelf collapsed, chunks of it are being carried on these waves," the man explained, and fuck, with only surface logic going on here, that would explain the open ocean tsunami.

"How long? Do we have time to get some helicopters out here, get these people off the ship?" Hayden asked, and the man swallowed.

"We have twenty minutes. Probably less. The WMO said this second wave is moving at 800 miles per hour."

Sam shook his head. "That's ridiculous. Even tsunamis can't move faster than the speed of sound," he muttered to Dean.

"Yeah, well, shark tornadoes," Dean shot back.

"There's a fire in the engine room, they're trying to contain it. They're already putting people in the lifeboats, but Hayden, this ship won't survive another hit, and neither will any of the lifeboats," the man said, and Dean's breath caught. _Fuck_. If they stayed on the ship, they would go down with it. If they got into a lifeboat, they were just as screwed.

He turned away, not needing to hear any more. Sam and Castiel were obviously thinking along the same lines as him, just from the looks on their faces, and Dean forced the panic down.

"Okay. We have twenty minutes at best. We can't be on this boat, or in a lifeboat. What's left?" he asked, knowing that rescue helicopters were not going to make it in time.

"Underwater. It will be safest underwater," Castiel said, and Dean rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, thanks, little mermaid, but we kind of need to breathe."

"No, he's right," Sam said and then he was turning around, searching the room for something. He obviously spotted it, because he weaved past the people still sitting or lying on the floor, only stopping when he got to a steward. Whatever he said to the poor guy resulted in a really confused look, and then the man pointed toward one of the doors, talking to Sam before quickly moving on.

"What was that about?" Dean asked as Sam returned, and Sam looked a little more hopeful now, though not by much.

"Dean, the people on this boat are filthy rich. And this isn't the only route this ship was supposed to take," he explained. "They have some scuba gear downstairs in a storage room, for one of the southern routes, in case a customer forgot their gear."

"Scuba gear?" Castiel repeated with a frown.

"Yeah, Cas, it's stuff that lets people breathe underwater for a while," Sam explained, and Dean laughed.

"You want to jump out and _scuba dive_?" 

"You got a better idea? Because Cas is right, if we're on the surface of the water when this hits, we're as good as dead."

Dean scoffed. No, he didn't have a better idea, but the idea of grabbing some scuba gear and hoping the tanks were filled and ready sounded completely ridiculous. Then again, ridiculous seemed to be what worked best in these bizarro-worlds.

"Fine. Let's do it," he said, and Sam didn't waste any time leading the way toward the door, in the opposite direction of people heading for the lifeboats. Those people were stepping right into a death trap, but there was no way to make the situation any better- they weren't going to believe someone who said getting in the lifeboats on a sinking ship was a _bad_ idea. It seemed that Hayden and the crew weren't bothering to stop loading the lifeboats either, or tell the passengers what was coming, because what good could it do?

It would cause more panic, and that was one thing they didn't need more of right now.

They stepped into the hallway just about the time an explosion made the whole ship shudder; it didn't sound incredibly close, but an explosion anywhere on this ship was far from a good thing.

"Looks like they didn't get the fire contained," Sam said, taking a deep breath before starting to walk again, toward the stairs. Nearby two girls were arguing with their boyfriends about going down to the rooms and getting their jewelry and wallets; one girl was holding the elevator door open, waiting on her friend, who was busy fighting with her boyfriend about it.

None of them seemed to see a problem with taking the elevator on a ship that was more and more likely to lose power with each passing minute, especially if it was on _fire_.

"How far down?" Dean asked Sam as they started the trek down the stairs, the ship creaking and groaning.

"Five floors down, turn left at the bottom, storage closet all the way at the end of the hall."

"Seriously? If the ship is sinking, don't you think we're gonna find, I don't know, _water_ down there?"

"Then we'll just have to get down there and back up before the water gets there."

Dean groaned and checked again to make sure Castiel was behind him, because the guy had taken a hard hit to his head; sure, Dean's shoulder was aching and throbbing, but it was probably nowhere near the headache Castiel had right now. He was keeping up, though, even as they passed the fourth floor down.

On the fifth floor down, Sam skidded to a stop near the bottom of the stairs, and Dean cursed loudly.

There was already a foot of water on the floor. If they left the staircase and the water was rising too fast, they would be trapping themselves and pretty much guaranteeing that they would drown.

"Come on. I don't think it's rising that fast," Sam said, continuing down into the water and immediately tensing up like he'd been shocked. "Oh fuck. _Fuck_, that's cold."

Yeah, Dean already knew he was going to regret this. He decided to get it over with, though, stepping down into the water as quick as he could, and the shock of it took his breath away. It was so cold it almost felt like it was burning his skin, hundreds of needles soaking through his socks and pants and jabbing at his skin.

He knew when Castiel hit the water without even looking, because he heard the same gasp from him.

"Okay. Fast. Let's do this fast," Dean insisted, because he didn't know how long he could take this, and he was not even going to think about staying underwater in water this cold waiting for this tsunami to pass overhead. Didn't it only take like, three minutes to die in water this cold? His feet were already going numb, filled with that painfully intense pins-and-needles feeling as they trudged down the hall toward the door marked "Storage".

"Sam, Dean. The ship is tilting," Castiel pointed out, and Dean quickly realized he was right- the water at the end of the hallway was a little deeper, the trek to the storage room a little easier. The whole ship was slowly tilting forward.

Sam tried the handle of the storage room and found it locked, but he didn't hesitate to back up and slam his foot into the door. It flew open and slammed against the wall, and Sam stepped inside, the lights flickering as he did.

If they lost power down here, they were ultra screwed. Water rising equaled screwed, no lights equal ultra screwed.

He started searching on the opposite side of the room as Sam, and it only took moments before he spotted two slick grey tanks on the floor, each one strapped into bulky black lifejacket type vests. "Over here," he said, hauling them away from the wall.

"Two of them?" Sam asked, and Dean shrugged.

"I need to stick with Cas anyway. He'll need help if he can't swim. We'll switch off on the air," he said, too stressed to follow up with a joke about swapping spit with Cas. Sam checked the gauges attached to the tanks and sighed with relief.

"They're full. We're good to go," he said, and Dean grabbed one and lifted it out of the water, turning toward Castiel.

"Turn around," he said, and Castiel gave him an uncertain look before turning; Dean tugged the vest over his arms, then stepped in front of him and snapped the buckles, pulling the straps tight. Sam was pulling his on too, because the water was halfway up their thighs now, and steadily rising. They had to be ready.

"This goes in your mouth. It lets you breathe normally, okay? Don't breathe through your nose at all," Dean explained, and Castiel swallowed hard and nodded, studying the mouthpiece that Dean was holding up. Dean clipped it onto the vest within easy reach, hoping that none of these other tubes or buttons were terribly important- they just needed the air to work. As long as they could breathe, they could deal with the rest.

The absurdity of the situation struck him, seeing Castiel standing there in a disheveled tuxedo, shivering, a _dive vest_ of all things strapped to him, and he couldn't help but laugh. Castiel tilted his head and narrowed his eyes at Dean.

"I don't see what's humorous about this."

"Everything is humorous about this. This is the stupidest fucking thing I've ever done in my life," Dean said. Sam didn't look convinced.

"Dean, you've thrown bombs at tornadoes full of sharks within the past 6 hours."

"Yeah, but throwing bombs at sharks at least makes some kind of sense."

Sam rolled his eyes and headed for the door. "Come on. We have to get to the deck and find a way to the water. Unless the ship is listing enough already to jump safely," he said, hesitating again as the lights flickered, went off, and came back on.

"I smell smoke," Castiel pointed out, and Dean took in a deep breath- he could smell it too, and with every step it got stronger.

"Fuck. If we get trapped between fire and water I'm going to kill something."

There was nothing to do but head upward. By the time they got back to the stairs, the water was up to Dean's waist, leaving his skin feeling about five sizes too small for his body; even climbing out of the water onto the stairs was little relief from the pain of the sheer cold.

And only one flight up, they were choking on smoke billowing into the stairwell. Dean could feel the heat of the fire through the closed door, and the smoke wasn't going to get any better the higher up they went. They couldn't exactly sprint for it, not with Sam and Castiel having extra weight strapped to their back- the tanks and vests weren't light.

"Go. Quick," Dean choked out to Sam, lifting his arm to cover his nose and mouth with his sleeve.

Three more flights. They could do this. They had to do this. Dean was not dying in one of Gabriel's stupid games. Well, not again, anyway. And he definitely wasn't dying in some douche-owned cursed ship. Fuck that.

By the time they got to the last set of stairs they were all coughing, Dean's eyes stinging and watering from the smoke as he grabbed Castiel and hauled him up the last few steps and into the hallway. From here he could hear the pandemonium on the deck, the people yelling and crying, and the hallway was nearly tilted forward enough to make walking difficult. Probably tilted enough that it wouldn't be a far jump from the bow of the ship to the water.

"Almost there," Sam said, pausing only a moment to take a few breaths of the mostly smoke free air before he continued down the hallway. Castiel was bent over, his hands on his knees as he caught his breath, the cut on his forehead still oozing blood.

"Not much farther, Cas," Dean said, his voice rough from the smoke; he waited for Castiel to follow after Sam toward the door to the outside before he fell into step behind them.

They didn't make it there.

Sam stopped halfway to the door and frowned. "Do you…do you guys hear that?" he asked, and Dean wanted to laugh, because he was hearing a lot of things right now- sobbing, screaming, the creaking of lifeboats being moved around, and-

And a low rumble. Like a distant train that was rapidly becoming not so distant.

"Oh, _shi_-"

The whole ship jerked so dramatically to the side that Dean slammed into the wall hard enough to rattle his jaw and make his head spin. He tried to stand, but the wall was _below_ him now, and the roar was deafening, the whole world seeming to tilt on its axis as the ship continued its roll.

Then the water rushed in.

It slammed through the hallway with enough force to knock Dean head over feet, and he felt someone grab onto him, but the water quickly tore them away. Dean was struggling to keep his head above water, trying to keep from getting body-slammed into the wall again, but he couldn't even breathe- the sheer cold of the water made his lungs freeze up, left him dizzy and confused, it was so fucking _cold_-

He felt his foot hit something that gave way, and he realized it was the glass cover on a light- the lights that had been on the ceiling were under him now, the hallway was almost filled to the floor with water, and Cas- shit, Cas couldn't swim in this, and they needed to get out before the ship actually sank with them trapped inside.

"Cas!" he yelled, twisting in the water, and the lights chose that moment to flicker and die for the last time. Dean felt like his heart was going to beat out of his chest; there was no time left. He couldn't see anything as he pressed his hands to the carpet that was now over his head, and he took one more breath before the water closed in on him.

He had to try and find his way to the door. It was a straight shot, he had to try, at least- maybe he could hold his breath long enough to get to the surface. He pushed his way along the walls toward the end of the hall, only to collide with something, and then there were hands closing on his in the dark.

It was Cas. He didn't even know how he knew, just from the touch alone, but he knew it was Cas. He felt something hard and plastic pressed into his hand, and he realized what it was about the time his head was throbbing with the need for air- it was the mouthpiece attached to the tank. He fumbled with it and finally got his mouth around it, taking a few deep breaths, having to force the air in and out when all his lungs wanted to do were shut down against the cold.

Cas was already tugging at him, pulling him toward the door, and Dean got one last good breath before he pushed the regulator back into Castiel's hand. It felt like it took forever to reach the end of the pitch black hallway, passing the regulator back and forth every twenty seconds or so, but eventually he felt Cas pause in front of him before continuing on.

Outside wasn't much better. Even as he kicked into open water it was impossible to see, but he definitely felt it when Castiel started to panic without the hallway to keep him from sinking; he kicked hard to try and keep from sinking, but the weight tied around him didn't help. Dean wrapped an arm tightly around Castiel's waist, and though it wasn't exactly easy to swim while supporting someone else, he shoved away from the ship and tried to figure out where to go.

He had to get them out from under the ship before it sank any deeper. He felt for the deck over their heads and moved steadily along it, pausing only to steady Castiel or take the regulator to get a few breaths of air, and he could have cried with relief when he felt the railing at the edge of the deck. He pushed down, keeping Castiel close as he got them both on the other side of the railing and into open water.

He couldn't do this much longer. His lungs were burning from holding his breath so much, his legs felt like they were on fire and numb at the same time from supporting both Castiel and himself in the freezing water, and he was so cold that he was past the point of shivering. He tightened his grip on Castiel and forced himself to keep swimming, because now he could see the dim light of the moon and stars beyond the water's surface; they were almost there.

When they finally broke the surface, it was with Dean holding onto Castiel as tight as he could, their noses nearly touching in the night air. Castiel was doing a shitty job of trying to swim, clinging to Dean like a life raft, his feet colliding with Dean's legs as he desperately tried to keep afloat.

"Dean!"

Dean twisted toward the sound, and he'd never been happier to see Sam than right now, especially since Sam was sitting on an overturned lifeboat that looked like it would hold all three of them. Unfortunately, the water between them and the lifeboat was also crowded with lifeless bodies, still floating in their life vests, skin white and eyes vacant.

"C-C'mon, Cas," he said, forcing his exhausted body to keep going, keep moving, and fuck, were they the only ones who survived this? He didn't see anyone else alive. Just wreckage, bent chunks of railing and broken furniture, and dead bodies.

By the time he made it to the lifeboat he was nearly dragging Castiel along, his feet kicking feebly in the water, his whole body nearly numb and twitching with the cold. Sam reached out and grabbed onto Castiel, hauling him onto the curved bottom of the boat before helping Dean out of the water.

Sam had already taken off his vest and tank, and he set to work helping Castiel out of his as Dean collapsed on the boat, his head spinning and his whole body aching fiercely. The chilly air wasn't really helping the whole 'cold' part of the equation, but at least he didn't have to worry about drowning now. Or getting dragged to the bottom of the ocean with the ship.

Speaking of, he slowly pushed himself back up and looked around for the ship, which was a whole lot harder to spot in the light they had- and especially now that just the dark bottom of the ship was showing, the belly of it curving up and out of the water, and slowly disappearing.

"I can't believe t-that worked," he said, every word coming out weak and shaky. Everything was so quiet now, just the sound of the water around them, water that seemed almost unnaturally calm after what had just happened.

"I've d-decided I don't like swimming," Castiel muttered, and Sam laughed and shook his head.

"Yeah, I…I really can't b-blame you."

Just as the last of the ship slipped beneath the waves, Dean heard the distinct sound of a helicopter in the air, and he looked up to try and spot it, but the sound got louder, then painfully loud, almost static-like, and he clamped his hands over his ears-

-just as the boat seemed to drop out from under him and the world around them fell away.


	3. Mongolian Death Worm

It was warm.

Not THAT warm, though; it wasn't a sweltering desert or the tropics, but just about anything felt warm after climbing out of freezing water into even colder air. Dean's clothes were blissfully dry, no longer clinging to him- well, more like not freezing to him; his clothes were also back to normal, no more awkward tuxedo.

They were standing on a rough dirt road, and in every direction stretched empty land. It reminded him of Kansas, actually, except there were no fields of crops filling the space here. This was just an expanse of open land and shrubs, with trees here and there, but no buildings or signs of life within sight. If he squinted, he could see a vague outline against the horizon that might be distant mountains.

"Where are we?" Sam asked, even though he probably knew the answer to that question already; it wasn't like even Castiel could tell where they were, without his mojo handy.

"No idea," Dean said, still shaking off the phantom feeling of cold; Castiel was feeling it too, because he was still shivering a little. "But I don't see any flying sharks or ocean, so that's something."

"We're somewhere in Eastern Asia," Castiel said, eyes focused on the field beside them. Dean raised an eyebrow.

"How can you tell? There's nothing around."

"The plant life. And the mountains. I recognize it," Castiel said, and he was still shaking- he should have stopped shivering by now, at least. Dean moved toward him and set a hand on his shoulder with a frown.

"Hey, you okay, Cas?"

Castiel blinked and hesitated before he looked at Dean and nodded. "Yes. A little weak, but…it will likely pass."

"Dean, he's probably starving," Sam pointed out, and Dean rolled his eyes.

"We're all starving, Sam, it's been two days since we had anything to eat."

"Yeah, two days for us. He probably hasn't eaten in _months_," Sam said, and Dean opened his mouth, and then closed it again. Fuck, Sam was right; He couldn't remember the last time he saw Castiel eat anything, and now with his mojo drained, there was nothing sustaining him. He was probably into full-on starvation while Dean was complaining about a noisy stomach.

"I'll be fine. There's no need to worry," Castiel said, but Sam and Dean ignored him, because neither believed him.

"Okay. First order of business is finding food, before tornadoes or sharks or anything happen," Dean said, looking both directions down the road, and choosing to head away from the mountains rather than toward them. There would be less people living in the mountains, or so he would think.

"So we get healed between every…whatever, and sometimes a change of clothes, but that's about it," Sam pointed out, having tugged his sleeve up as he walked to reveal unmarred skin where he'd once been cut. Dean's shoulder didn't hurt at all now, and while before it had been because of the cold making him numb, now it was because there was no wound at all.

"If he left us injured, we wouldn't last very long," Castiel pointed out, and Dean laughed.

"How thoughtful. He wants to drag us through as many horror movies as possible," he said. "He could at least take away the need to sleep, too."

Dean was exhausted; he was sure Castiel and Sam were as well, but there was no telling when they would find a place that seemed safe enough to stop and rest. Anything could happen, absolutely anything, so sleep almost seemed entirely out of the question. His legs burned from all the running and swimming, his mind was getting scrambled with the need for sleep, and he couldn't give in to it.

"Speaking of…have you thought about what Gabriel said? Do you know what he might be talking about?" Sam asked, his voice hesitant. "I mean, he said it's all on you. There's got to be something."

"You know what I think? I think he's a psycho," Dean snapped, because he was not about to take the blame for this shit. No, this was a crazy archangel who'd come back from the dead without any of his marbles.

"Look, even when he was doing that Groundhog Day thing, he was trying to make a point. A really fucked up point in a really fucked up way, but still," Sam said, though there was a good amount of bitterness in his tone. Not that it made Dean feel any better.

"Why don't you ask Cas? It's _his_ brother."

Cas flinched and his shoulders sagged the slightest bit, and Dean immediately felt the guilt hit him- this wasn't Castiel's fault, either. Dean should know better than anyone that family can't always keep each other in line.

Hell, family can _rarely_ keep each other in line.

But he didn't get the chance to apologize. He heard the distant sound of a loud motor behind them, and they all looked back to see a red pickup truck coming toward them, a dirt cloud kicked up behind it. The truck rolled to a stop beside them, and a young man with short sandy colored hair and a couple days of beard rolled the window down.

"What the hell are you all doin' walking around out here?" he asked, and Dean hesitated- but luckily, Sam jumped in before Castiel could inevitably tell the guy the exact truth.

"We're backpacking," he said, and the man stared skeptically.

"…without backpacks?"

"We got mugged," Dean said, though it stung his pride a bit to have this guy thinking they were a trio of idiots wandering around getting mugged. The guy didn't look amused by it, though- in fact, he kind of looked impressed.

"And they didn't even rough you up? Lucky," he said with a low whistle. "The bandits out here are vicious. Surprised they didn't just shoot you."

"It, uh…seemed like they were in a hurry. Listen, can we maybe get a lift to the nearest town? We'd really appreciate it," Sam asked, and the guy laughed.

"Yeah, sure. Not like I'll make you hike seven hours to the next place with water," he said, leaning over and opening the passenger door for them. Dean and Castiel wordlessly gave Sam the front seat, instead climbing in the smaller backseat, where a case of bottled water sat on the floor between them.

"Feel free," the man said, gesturing to the water, and Dean didn't hesitate. He grabbed two and handed one off to Sam and Castiel each, then took one for himself; all three of them drained over half a bottle before stopping for breath.

"You guys must've been walking a while," the man said with a chuckle, pulling back onto the road. "I'm Daniel."

"I'm Sam. This is my brother, Dean, and that's our friend Cas," Sam said. "So, uh…where are we, exactly? Our bags had our GPS in it, we've been walking a while. No idea where we are," he added, and Dean smirked a little that Sam managed to ask such a strange question in a way that wouldn't raise eyebrows.

"You're in the middle of fuckin' nowhere, that's where you are," Daniel said, the road rough enough that Dean's teeth clacked together on the worst bumps in the road. "We're about 700 miles south of Sanglyn Dalay, a little farther than that from Mandalgovi. Go any farther south and you'll hit the Gobi Desert."

Dean was pretty sure the guy wasn't speaking English anymore, and hell if he could point exactly to the Gobi Desert on a map, but he at least knew Castiel had been right; they were definitely in East Asia somewhere. "So what are you doing out here, then?" he asked, leaning forward against the back of Sam's seat.

"I'm exploring a little myself, but…more specifically," Daniel said, straightening up a little. "I'm trying to find Genghis Khan's tomb."

"What makes you think it's here?" Sam asked with a frown. "They've been looking for decades. Nobody's found it."

"Believe me, I have my reasons," Daniel said, and there was definitely more to the story, but Dean didn't want to push their luck. After all, they had to make nice with this guy for the next seven hours if they didn't want to starve trying to walk blindly through endless shrub lands.

"There are some granola bars in the bag under your seat. You guys are probably hungry, go ahead and have at them. There's more food in the back we can eat later, when we make camp," Daniel pointed out, and Sam thanked him and leaned forward, pulling the backpack out from under the seat.

"Make camp?" Dean repeated, and Daniel nodded.

"It's almost sunset, and these roads aren't safe after dark. Terrain's too rough and bandits are more active," he explained. "It's easier to find some trees and make camp for the night than try and drive through it."

All in all there were seven granola bars, and Sam took two and passed the rest back to Dean. Dean promptly shoved three of them into Castiel's hands and gave him a stern look, not even letting him start in about having more food than them; luckily, Castiel seemed to understand and didn't put up a fight about it. Dean did have to show him how to open the wrapper without completely mutilating it, though.

Normally granola bars were about as appealing as eating cardboard, but after two days with no food, just about anything looked gourmet to Dean. He wolfed one down in less than a minute, one eye on Castiel as the angel studied the granola bar skeptically, then took a small bite.

After that, though, the hunger must have kicked in to high gear, because Castiel put the bars away as quickly as Sam and Dean did. While it was hardly a full meal, it did take the edge off, at least.

None of them expected to see a truck on the road ahead, coming in their direction at an equally slow pace; and when it got closer, they were equally surprised to see the lights affixed to the top and the word "POLICE" in bold letters on the side of the truck.

"It's all good, I know this guy," Daniel said as the truck honked a couple times and started to slow. Sam gave Dean a confused look.

"Why does his truck say 'police'? I mean, we're in Mongolia," Sam said, and Dean was glad he'd figured out where they were from that mess of words Daniel spouted earlier. Didn't explain why nobody was speaking Mongolian in Mongolia, but Dean shrugged, because that was the least of their worries.

The truck pulled alongside them and rolled down its window, and Daniel did the same, giving the officer inside a friendly wave.

"Daniel, you still out here digging around?" the officer said- in perfect English, Dean noticed- and Daniel shrugged.

"You know me, like a dog with a bone."

The officer snorted and eyed Sam. "Called in backup?"

"Nah, these guys were backpacking through and got mugged. I'm giving them a lift."

"Well…be careful," the officer said, his frown deepening as he tapped his fingers on the side of the door. "Earthquakes have been picking up. It's strange. And you know about the bandits."

Daniel nodded. "Sure. Yeah, I know. We'll play it safe."

Something about the last part of the conversation was odd- like they weren't just talking about earthquakes, and they both knew it. The police officer hesitated, and then rolled his window up and pulled away, and Daniel began to do the same.

"Earthquakes?" Sam said, making it obvious that he'd picked up on the strange tone of the conversation, too. Daniel sighed.

"They aren't bad, but there's been a lot of them. Locals are pretty sure that the new oil drilling place set up nearby is causing it," he explained with a shrug. "Not a big deal."

Dean wasn't convinced. He shared a look with Castiel, pretty sure that he wasn't the only one finding this whole thing suspicious, but Castiel was obliviously staring out the window at the nonexistent scenery as they drove.

Dean was almost certain that it would take more than a normal operation drilling for oil to cause a bunch of earthquakes. Now he was imagining the ground opening up underneath them disaster movie style, the earth ripping apart to reveal gaping chasms that seemed to be bottomless. He sat back in his seat with a frustrated huff and tried not to think about it.

He continued to try not to think about it until the sun was finally dipping below the horizon, and Daniel pulled off the road and into a stand of trees, maneuvering to a clearing big enough to set up camp. Sam and Dean got to work getting a fire going while Castiel helped Daniel unload the few things that they would need- bedrolls, blankets, a couple pots, some canned food, and more water.

"I've got one extra bedroll one of you can use. And a lot of blankets," Daniel said, stacking them in the grass, safely away from the fire. "Figure one of you can make a decent bed out of the blankets, and someone can take the backseat of the truck. Didn't know I'd be camping with a group tonight."

"Thank you," Castiel said with a smile, something Dean hadn't seen often. "You've been generous. We really appreciate it."

"Well, between the bandits and the…the, uh, earthquakes, I mean, it's not really safe out here right now," Daniel pointed out, sitting down by the fire and opening a couple cans of some kind of beef stew. Under normal conditions it would probably look nasty, but right now it felt like a gourmet meal; granola just didn't cut it. Dean needed some meat in his meals, thank you.

"You make it sound like they're not just earthquakes," Sam pointed out, and Daniel chuckled and shook his head.

"Some people around here think they're not. But it's all superstition and old legends."

Dean twisted the cap on a bottle of water and took a swig. "I'm a sucker for old legends. Come on, campfire story time," he said with a forced smile, because old legends were rarely good, and he had the feeling that this one might be a huge hint to what they were dealing with.

Daniel got the pot of stew hung on the rack over the fire, stirring slowly as he glanced up at them. "There are stories in the villages out here that there are giant creatures roaming the plains and deserts. They call it the olgoi-khorkhoi, which roughly translated means 'large intestine worm'."

"What, like a tapeworm?" Dean asked with a frown, and Daniel laughed.

"No, see, that's the rough translation. When you get into the legends, the more accurate term is the Mongolian Death Worm."

"I'm guessing they're not earthworm size worms, are they?" Sam asked, and Daniel probably missed it, but Dean could hear the frustrated resignation in Sam's tone. Death worms sounded exactly like something Gabriel would throw at them.

"No, they're supposedly the size of a small car. Sometimes bigger," Daniel said, and Dean glanced at Castiel, the angel's face glowing from the firelight. He was listening to the story rather intently, probably already working out a plan of attack versus giant worms of Death.

"It can spit acid and emit electrical charges, according to the stories. Has acidic skin, too, it'll melt your skin off if you touch it. And since it moves by burrowing through the ground, well, you can imagine the jokes when your car battery or cell phone go out," Daniel continued. "Just don't joke around the older people. Some of them even claim they've seen the things themselves. They're really serious about it."

"So these earthquakes…some believe they're caused by the worms' movement underground?" Castiel asked, and Daniel nodded.

"Exactly. But the earthquakes started up right after that rig started drilling. That's too much of a coincidence to ignore."

Normally, Dean would agree. But normally an arch angel wouldn't be pulling the strings.

They ate their meal in silence, the three of them going for seconds so quickly that Daniel gave them a strange look; as far as he knew, they were just hungry, not flat out starving. Dean really couldn't care less, going through the second bowl just as quick as the first.

When they'd finished, he volunteered to sleep in the back of the truck on the crappy backseat, and Sam eventually convinced Castiel to take the extra bedroll. With Sam in a cushion of blankets on the ground and the fire put out for the night, Dean made sure Castiel was settled in before he climbed into the truck and pulled the door shut. He laid down and stared at the ceiling of the truck for a while, the world eerily silent around the truck as his thoughts finally had the chance to consume him.

What _did_ Gabriel mean? What was the guy looking for, what did he want Dean to do to end this? He'd said to dig deep, that Dean already knew it inside, and just needed to figure it out. But how the hell was he supposed to concentrate on gooey inner feelings when he was dodging flying sharks and death worms?

And why did Gabriel insist that Castiel had to go through this too?

None of this made any sense to him. So far what he'd learned was that every one of these alternate realities was going to have some fucked up weather, or monster, and if there was some kind of life lesson there aside from 'don't get eaten or drown', he didn't see it.

His mind was still churning away on the confusion when he finally fell into a blissfully dreamless sleep.

* * *

Dean woke up to the sound of a gunshot.

He didn't panic or immediately go for the door, but his heart was stuck somewhere in his throat as he turned over and pushed himself up onto his hands and knees, just high enough to peek out the window. Five men in fatigues stood in their small camp, and it looked like the gunshot had just been a warning shot into the air, because no one looked injured; Daniel, Sam, and Castiel looked about how Dean felt- sleepy and irritated at the incredibly rude awakening.

"On your feet, hands up!" one of the men yelled, once again in perfect English, because nobody in Mongolia actually spoke Mongolian. Obviously.

They hadn't noticed Dean yet- there was no reason for them to think somebody would be sleeping in the truck. He watched as Sam, Castiel, and Daniel slowly stood, hands held up as the trigger happy men crowded in on them.

"Take them back to camp. Those two go in the empty tent, tie them up good. I have business to discuss with Daniel," the man in charge continued, sneering at Daniel and waving the other bandits off. At least, he assumed they were bandits, because otherwise the Mongolian military was letting its soldiers do Boy Scout style camp outs to harass travelers.

Dean tensed with anger as two of the men grabbed Castiel roughly by the arms- he was cooperating, they didn't need to fuckin' rough him up- and clenched his jaw when Sam got the same treatment, both of them dragged to a green truck nearby. The soldiers pushed them up into the back of the truck, and Dean saw flashes of rope as their hands were bound, Daniel shoved in the back of the truck not long after.

Dean froze and held his breath as the guy in charge turned back toward the campsite, his eyes sweeping over the clearing and settling on the truck for a few long moments. One of the soldiers yelled something, and the man hesitated only a few moments longer before turning and going back to their vehicles.

Dean let out the breath he'd been holding as Castiel, Sam, and Daniel were shoved down to a sitting position in the back of the truck, then both trucks pulled away from the clearing and back toward the road. As soon as they were out of sight, he got out of the back and ran for the front seat, getting in and feeling for a key in the ignition- and luckily, Daniel had left the keys in place.

He had to go after them. Daniel had something to do with those guys, a personal conflict that he hadn't bothered to mention, and now Sam and Castiel were getting shoved around by guys with AK-47s because of it. He turned the truck on and pulled out of the clearing, edging onto the road slowly in case they were still nearby.

There was one good thing about the dirt roads- they held tracks. And with so few vehicles out here, the tracks from the two trucks were fresh in the dirt, a perfect trail to follow. He'd have to take it slow; he didn't want to drive right up to their camp. Or have the guys see the truck in the rearview mirror and recognize it.

Maybe he could steal a gun from their camp; he wasn't sure how much good it would do against giant death worms, but it sure would feel good to put a bullet in the foot of those two soldiers who were dragging Castiel around like a PoW.

It wasn't far to their camp; he drove for about 20 minutes before he saw the beige tents through the trees, and there were a lot of them. These guys weren't modest about the operation they were running, that was for sure.

Dean pulled the truck off the road and into some nearby trees to hide it as best he could. He briefly looked to see if Daniel had a weapon of any kind stashed in the truck, but evidently he didn't mind the odds out here of 'bandits have weapons and I don't'. He cursed softly and closed the truck door as quietly as he could manage, then made his way slowly through the trees to the edge of the camp.

They didn't have perimeter guards. They had a few guards wandering around inside the camp, but for the most part, it looked like a good amount of their crew was gathered around the fire pit, drinking and laughing about something.

There was no way to tell which tent Sam and Castiel would be in, but he had a good idea that he knew which tent Daniel was in- the leader had said something about having business with him. The only tent that had guards posted was the farthest from the road, and if the leader was in there, Daniel probably was too.

Dean moved that way, instincts from Purgatory creeping back in as he moved toward the back of that tent. As soon as he was close enough to hear voices, he knelt down and listened.

"-and you're wasting your time, because I haven't gotten anywhere yet. I don't know where it is," Daniel was saying, and Dean remembered him telling them that he was looking for Genghis Khan's tomb. What did the bandits want with a Mongolian dude's tomb? Was it like the Egyptian dude's tomb with all the treasure?

"I think you're lying," another voice said, and Dean recognized it as the leader from back at the camp. "But it doesn't matter. I'll just keep you here until you decide it's worth your freedom to lead me to the tomb." There was a pause, and then he added, "Take him back. Tie him up with the others."

"What do we do with the other two?" a different voice asked, and there was another short pause before the leader spoke again.

"If in an hour Daniel hasn't agreed to lead us to the tomb, bring one of the other two to me. Perhaps hearing some screams will change his mind."

There was the sound of the canvas tent flap being pushed aside, and Dean started moving again, staying in the trees but making sure he could see where the two men took Daniel. They pushed him forward with the muzzles of their guns, and Dean followed their progress across the camp to another tent. They were only inside a few minutes before the two bandits exited the tent without Daniel, and went to join their comrades at the fire.

Perfect. Dean had an hour window, and there weren't guards posted at the tent; as long as he could avoid the patrolling guards, he could slip inside and free them.

The important part of that being 'avoiding the patrolling guards', because they had some serious guns.

He picked his way through the trees and brush to the closest he could get to the tent without leaving his cover. He could see one guard working his way around to the tent, walking slowly, eyes sweeping over the outer edge of the camp as he walked. Dean ducked low as he passed, waiting for the guard to pass by and get on the other side of another tent before he made a break for it.

He slipped inside the tent without being noticed, letting the canvas fall closed behind him as he rushed to where Daniel, Sam, and Castiel were tied to chairs strapped against the center pole of the tent. Castiel sighed with relief, and Sam grinned.

"About time. I almost beat you to it," he said, wiggling his hand where he'd managed to loosen the ropes. Dean just rolled his eyes and helped Sam get out of the ropes, then moved on to Castiel while Sam freed Daniel.

"You alright, Cas?" he asked, keeping his voice low. Castiel nodded and rubbed his wrists, the skin still reddened from the tight ropes.

"I'm unharmed," he said, and Sam gave Dean an odd look- but Dean didn't have a chance to ask what it was about, because the next thing they heard was a scream and the sound of gunfire outside.

"Shit. We need to go, now," Daniel snapped, going for the exit without even checking for soldiers outside. He didn't need to; when Dean followed him, trying to get him to not jump out into a gunfight, the first thing Dean saw was the massive creature near the fire.

It was a giant worm, the size of a van, its segmented body bright red and reared up in fury as the men fired bullet after bullet. That wasn't the worst part, though- the worst part was its mouth, a circular hole right where the creature should have a face. It was ringed in teeth and dripping, and outside the mouth three large black pincers snapped and clenched; in fact, they clenched down on one of the soldier's arms, and dragged the screaming man into its gaping maw.

"Holy shit," Dean managed before Sam was yelling at him to go, that they had to get away while they had the chance. They ran for the trees, and even in that short distance between the tent and the brush, everything went to shit; a massive worm exploded out of the ground nearby, soil bursting up like a geyser around it. It was close enough that as Dean stumbled back he could smell the thing- a pungent, putrid smell that had him coughing when he tried to breathe in.

The worm screeched at him, the sound like a malfunctioning fire alarm, and just as loud, too- Dean started to back up, and just as the worm lurched forward, he dove away into the dirt. The pincers clicked together loudly behind him, Daniel already pulling him to his feet and away from the massive worm. Castiel and Sam leapt over a line of soil rippling up that seemed to be heading toward the fire, like a worm was just below the surface; as soon as they caught up, the four of them took off for the trees. Luckily for them, the guns and bonfire were a whole lot more interesting to the worms than the four of them.

All the while, Daniel was grim and determined- and suspiciously not shocked at all by the worms' sudden appearance.

The gunfire and screams got more distant the farther they went into the trees, until Daniel finally stopped so everyone could catch their breath. Dean leaned over for a moment and took some deep breaths, and then shot Daniel a glare.

"You knew about it," he said, angrier by the second. "You knew that those damn things were around, you knew you had bandits with a grudge against you, and you didn't bother telling us? That's kind of important info!"

"Would you have believed me?" Daniel shot back. "Would you honestly have believed me if I said 'hey, just so you know, there are giant man eating worms out here'?"

"Yes," Castiel said, rather deadpan, and Daniel gave him an odd look before shaking his head.

"Look, it doesn't matter anyway. We need to get back to the truck and get to the nearest town. Those guys won't follow us into a town, if any of them are left after those things are done with them," he said, running his fingers through his hair with an exasperated sigh.

"I'll take us to the truck while you explain everything you know here," Dean said, turning to head back toward the main road. He hoped that the trees would be a deterrent to the giant worms; it would be easier to evade them if they showed up, anyway. He didn't want to be caught out in the open with one of those on his heels.

"Basically, you know everything now," Daniel said as they walked. "I came here looking for Genghis Khan's tomb. The worms were just a legend, a folk tale. Then that oil company started drilling, we started having the earthquakes, and then the worms…"

He paused, shaking his head. "They started finding what was left of people. Thought it was some other animal, until someone hit one with their car. I saw it for myself. It was dead, but I knew it wasn't a fake. That was only a week ago."

"So you still think the oil company's drilling disturbed these worms, like…they were hibernating or something?" Sam said with a frown, and Daniel shrugged.

"Best guess we've got. I don't see any other reason for them to start showing up now."

Dean finally spotted the red of the truck through the trees, and he led them the rest of the way to it; Daniel got in the front seat, and Sam in the front with him, while Dean and Castiel slid into the backseat again. There was no longer gunfire or screams from the direction of the camp, just the smoke rising from the bonfire in the middle of it, and Dean had to wonder how many of those guys had escaped. Probably only the ones who were smart enough to not stand there and shoot at the things till they got eaten.

Daniel pulled out onto the road and pushed the truck as fast as he could, which still wasn't very fast on this road. Any second they could hit a pothole that could destroy a tire at higher speeds.

"Why was that guy asking you about the tomb?" Dean asked, leaning forward with his arm braced against the back of the driver's seat. "Sounded like you guys had a deal or something."

Daniel snorted. "We did. He wouldn't have his guys rob and shoot me on sight if I agreed to tell them when I found the tomb. Unfortunately, they don't have a great deal of patience."

"If it's a tomb full of treasure, somebody's gotta know something. People had to build the thing and get all the stuff in there," Dean pointed out, and Sam chuckled.

"Yeah, and they killed all the people who built it, and all the people who transported the body and anything else going in there. And they killed anyone who happened upon the funeral procession, too," he said, and Dean whistled low.

"Talk about a shitty retirement plan."

They lapsed into silence for the rest of the drive; it was nearly two hours later when they finally pulled up to the nearest 'town', which turned out to be a few crappy buildings and a well with a few even crappier houses scattered around. Somehow Dean imagined this wasn't really accurate to Mongolia, but nothing else had been so far; why start now?

There was a woman out at the well, but she didn't look like she was having much success. The buckets beside her were still bone dry, and when they got out of the car, Daniel approached her.

"What's going on?" he asked, and she sighed.

"Everyone is sick," she said with a thick accent, pointing to one of the buildings, which must have been a makeshift hospital. "And the well is dry. We are nearly out of water."

Daniel frowned. "When did this start?"

"With the earthquakes."

Well, there was another thing this oil company had supposedly managed to screw up. Dean was beginning to wonder why they were still allowed to drill, but then he thought of how many millions of dollars that company probably had compared to these villages. It made sense, then.

But then why was everyone sick?

Daniel seemed to have the same question; he headed straight for the building she had pointed to, and Sam gave Dean a shrug before following behind him. Dean and Castiel followed farther back, busy Dean questioning the intelligence of going into a building full of mysteriously sick people. With his luck, he'd end up with Ebola or something.

Inside the building dozens of cots were lined up, and on each cot someone lay coughing or sleeping, some of them looking worse off than others. A nurse nearby abandoned her cart when she saw the four of them, tugging her face mask down.

"Are you from the WHO? Did you bring medicine?" she asked, and Daniel shook his head.

"No, we're not…do you know what these people are sick with?" he asked, and the woman looked crestfallen, gesturing at the line of beds.

"They have a horrible cough and fever. They cannot eat," she explained. "Only a few of us did not get sick, and none of us drank the well water. It is some kind of poisoning."

Dean leaned in toward Sam. "Can earthquakes contaminate well water?"

"Could cause sediment to get into the water, but then the water would be discolored," Sam said with a shrug.

"It might not be the earthquakes," Castiel said, looking at the row of beds, deep in thought. "Daniel told us the legend said the worms have an acidic skin. A coating. If these creatures have become active and are moving through the groundwater as well, that acidic coating could be poisoning the water."

That made more sense to Dean than earthquakes randomly poisoning the water. "So, how do we get these things to re-hibernate?" he asked, and Castiel took a deep breath.

"We would likely have to remove the trigger that woke them in the first place."

Sam laughed softly. "Shut down an oil drill. Probably manned by hundreds of workers. Piece of cake."

"Perhaps if we tell them what's happening, they'll agree to stop drilling," Castiel said, and it was Dean who laughed at that.

"Oil is big money, Cas. The only way you'd shut down that kind of operation is by having even more money than them."

"The least we can do is check it out," Sam said with a shrug. "We can go have a look at the place, make sure we're right about this before we talk about sabotaging an oil drill."

Daniel caught the last bit of that as he returned to the three of them, and his eyebrows shot up. "What's this about sabotaging an oil drill?"

"We're not. We're just...going to check it out. See what's going on. You know where it is?" Dean asked, and Daniel nodded.

"I'll drive you out there. I'm curious too," he said with a grim look. "And I'd like to have a word with the people in charge over there, anyway."

Dean was about to tell them how ridiculously unrealistic it was to think that the guys in charge of the oil drill would take the time to talk to some random dudes in a truck, but then there was a scream from outside, and the sound of stone cracking. Dean rushed to the door, followed by Castiel and Sam, and flung it open hard enough to bounce it off the rusty hinges.

The woman who'd been at the well was running toward them, and not far behind her a massive death worm was halfway out of the destroyed well, pincers clicking as it screeched. Dean grabbed the girl and yanked her inside the second she got close enough, and then he slammed the door, wishing that this was more than an old wooden building.

"Find weapons!" he yelled, and the few people who weren't sick looked around helplessly. Sam was already moving, though, flipping over a wooden chair and telling Castiel to hold it still as he pried off each of the legs, tossing one to Dean and then one to Daniel. It would be too close combat for Dean's taste, but at least the end was jagged; it was better than nothing.

The worm slammed into the doors and they shuddered violently, and Dean knew they would only take one or two more blows before they gave in. The only good thing was the lack of windows in the building- the only windows were high up, near the ceiling and narrow.

"Don't let it touch you!" Daniel reminded them, and Dean laughed as the doors shuddered again.

"Didn't plan on it."

This time, the doors gave in, and the massive worm burst through.

Dean barely jumped out of the way of its pincers as they grabbed for him, and he swung the wooden chair leg like a bat, smacking the worm in the head and making it lurch to the other side. It snapped at Sam, its putrid smell filling the building as it moved farther in, and the people who were well enough huddled against the wall in their beds in terror.

"Sam! Over here!" Castiel yelled, climbing on the end of an empty bed, and Sam immediately understood. He gave the worm a firm hit and then backed up, and the creature screeched in fury and lunged after him. The second it was alongside the bed, Castiel brought down the wooden stake in his hands, driving the jagged end through the top of the worm's head.

It twitched and made a softer noise, then shuddered and slowly fell, hitting the wall and sliding down. Dean had to take a moment and look down at the ground, because the smell of the creature plus the smear of slime it left on the wall was just a little too much. Gross.

"We have to get that place shut down," Daniel said, stepping around the worm to the women huddled against the wall. "We'll leave the weapons with you. When we leave, barricade the door until we return. No one goes outside, understand?" he explained, and they nodded, wide-eyed and terrified.

Dean, Sam, and Daniel passed their weapons to the women- no one was about to try and retrieve Castiel's- and they checked outside for any more of the worms before making a break for the truck. Luckily that worm seemed to have been alone, and they got in the truck and pulled away as the doors to the building slammed shut once again.

"We've got to figure something out. They won't be able to protect themselves forever," Sam pointed out, but it was something all of them already had on their mind. Dean knew they would have to find some way to shut down that rig; otherwise, things would only get worse. There was no telling how many of those worms were still hiding underground.

"How far to this oil rig?" Dean asked, and Daniel hesitated a moment.

"Less than an hour, I think."

Dean sat back with a sigh, looking over at Castiel; the angel was frowning out the window, arms crossed and jaw tense. Dean raised an eyebrow, and then gave him a nudge.

"Cas? You okay?" he asked, quietly enough that Sam and Daniel wouldn't overhear over the loud engine.

"I could have healed them if I had my grace," Castiel said, not looking at Dean. "I could have healed all those people."

Oh. That was what he was upset about.

"You saved their lives anyway. You killed that thing before it got to them," Dean pointed out. "And if we can do something about this rig, the water will get back to normal."

That didn't seem to reassure Castiel. He looked as if he was still beating himself up for not being able to heal every single one of those people, and it wasn't a surprise at all.

After all, Dean was the one who'd said that without his powers Castiel was just a 'baby in a trench coat'.

_Good going, Dean, _he thought, leaning back in his seat and trying to ignore the guilt gnawing at him. He got to dwell on it, though, for the next hour, until they finally got within view of the massive oil operation- and immediately realized something was off.

"There's…only one car there," Dean said, eyes scanning all the empty space around the main building. He may not know a ton about drilling for oil, but he was fairly certain it took more than one person.

"Maybe they've shut down temporarily," Sam said, but Dean didn't believe that for a second.

The chain link gates were left open, and they drove straight past the empty guard shack and toward the biggest building. When they got closer, it was obvious that something was really wrong- a man was lying motionless and face down at the base of the steps leading up to the doors.

Daniel pulled the truck to a stop and Dean leapt out, rushing over to the man and immediately shaking him to see if he was just unconscious- no luck. He reached down and checked for a pulse, but there was nothing- and then he saw the stain in the dirt underneath him. He shoved at the guy's shoulder to roll him onto his back, and then it became apparent just what had killed the guy; he had a bullet wound right in the middle of his chest.

"What the hell is going on here…?" Daniel said, looking around for anyone else, anyone at all, but the place seemed abandoned. Sam sighed.

"Let's see if we can get inside."

Turned out, getting inside was easy; the door was unlocked. And inside, things only got even more confusing.

"This isn't right," Sam muttered, moving to the nearest machine and swiping his finger through the dust on it. "These machines haven't been used in weeks, at least. So why are the worms still waking up?"

"Over here," Castiel said, standing by a door that had three different 'warning' and 'restricted area' signs posted on it. But like the front door, this one was unlocked as well, and led to a staircase that disappeared into pitch black below. Daniel found a few hard hats sitting nearby, and switched each of them on before handing them out. Dean helped Castiel strap and buckle his, though the angel didn't seem to like having a light strapped to his head.

"Here goes," Sam muttered, starting down the staircase, and Dean laughed.

"Come on, you've been in creepier places than this."

"Yeah, but never knowing the place might be infested with giant man eating worms."

The stairs seemed to go on forever, and when they finally got to the bottom, it wasn't a concrete floor they stepped onto. Instead it was an uneven stone floor, covered in thick dust with a trail of footprints back and forth from the base of the stairs. Everywhere Dean aimed his light as they walked was just stone walls, a dark hallway leading farther toward what had to be underneath the hill behind the oil drill.

"Wait a second," Daniel said, and he stopped and knelt down- his head lamp lit up a thick black wire, running along the floor. He followed it to a type of small generator, and when he flipped the switch on it, the whole area lit up with lights strung on hooks in the walls.

It was a massive underground chamber, stone pillars in orderly rows every dozen feet or so, and wooden crates stacked along the walls. Sam went to one of the crates, and Dean moved to help him lift the top off it, letting it fall to the floor with a loud clatter.

"Jesus Christ," Dean muttered, staring into the box- neatly packed in some crumpled paper were dozens of golden plates with intricate designs carved on them. Sam carefully lifted one out of the paper, turning it over in his hands.

"This has to be hundreds of years old, at least," he said, and Daniel was already prying the lid off the next crate and reaching in.

"They found it," he said with a laugh, lifting a handful of jewelry out of the crate. "They found the tomb. That's why they're not drilling, when they found this they just used the rig as a cover to smuggle all this treasure out."

"Then what's disturbing the worms?" Castiel asked, looking around the room. It was so big that the lights strung on this wall didn't even hit the other side of the room, where there was probably more crated treasure or unpacked treasures.

"It's the curse," Daniel said. "It's another old legend, that the death worms guard the tomb of Genghis Khan. They aren't disturbed by the drilling, they're guarding the tomb."

"Doing a shitty job of it, considering it's all packed up," Dean said with a snort, and Sam shrugged.

"Maybe not. Sometimes these old tombs have more than one level. If they've only been in this first room, what we're seeing now may just be the first wave. The deterrent," he said, and about the time he finished, there was a crash from the other side of the room. The treasures were quickly put back, and Dean looked around for anything that could be used as a weapon; unfortunately, while he was sure some of this treasure had to be weapons, there were dozens of unlabeled crates here.

"We need to get out of here," Castiel said, staring into the blackness on the other side of the room.

Then, all hell broke loose.

A worm slithered into view from the dark, going straight for Castiel, and Dean dragged him out of the way and stumbled back. "Come on!" he said, and Sam grabbed a reluctant Daniel and dragged him away from the crates, back toward the stairs. There was a hiss behind them, too close for comfort, then an answering screech from farther back.

"Fuck, we woke all of them up," Dean said, taking the stairs as quickly as he could back to the main level.

When they got there, the first thing they saw were guns.

Two men stood by the open door, suits rumpled, and each of them had a gun in hand, pointed toward the door. Dean skidded to a stop, and then looked behind him to make sure the others made it.

"Listen, we need to get out of here. Those things are coming," he said to the men, but their expressions didn't change. One of them laughed.

"Oh, you're not going anywhere."

Dean wanted to tell the guy to drop the villain act and run, because those worms wouldn't get stopped by bullets, but the ground started to tremble underneath them. It only got worse, to the point where it was hard to keep their balance on the cracking concrete floor- and then the floor behind the men exploded upward.

The worm that emerged was beyond massive. Its head nearly hit the ceiling and it wasn't even a third of the way out of the hole it had made; it was like the queen of all the worms they'd seen. It made the other worms look fun-sized.

And its mouth was coming toward them.

Dean and the others dove out of the way, but the suited men were obviously not that smart, because their first instinct was to shoot at it. The mama worm didn't even flinch, its mouth coming down on both of them with a sick, squelching sound.

"Where's the control room?" Sam yelled, and Dean looked past the giant worm, to the other side of the machinery floor; there were stairs leading up to a glassed in room.

"This way!" he said, and Sam, Castiel, and Daniel followed him behind a row of machines and toward the stairs, hoping the mama worm would stay busy with her snack for a minute. Daniel caught up to Sam, trying to slow him down.

"Wait, what are you going to do?"

"We've got to destroy this place before that worm gets out," Sam said, and Daniel's eyes widened.

"You can't! Do you realize what's down there? This is Genghis Khan's tomb!"

"Yeah, and it's also ground zero for giant acid worms, which I hate a little more than destroying some old plates," Dean snapped, taking the stairs two at a time up to the control room. Inside there were massive control panels on every wall, each one turned on but sitting idle.

"How do we do this?" Sam asked, looking around like there might be a self-destruct button or something equally ridiculous. Dean wasn't going to take the time to try and find an elegant answer- instead he went to a console and started pushing every button and flipping every lever. It wasn't long before the whole console was flashing and beeping in warning, and Sam got the idea, going to another console and doing the same thing. Daniel looked at them with obvious distress, and then looked back out the windows at the mama worm- and he came to some kind of a decision, because he joined in on a third panel.

"What is that going to do?" Castiel asked, watching Dean with a frown as he turned some kind of valve. Dean shrugged.

"No idea, but if we press enough buttons something's bound to fuck up," he said. An alarm started blaring, loud enough that all three of them flinched; red lights were flashing all over, they could hear the grinding of machinery starting up outside, and the hiss of steam escaping something.

"Okay, yeah, we'd better go," Sam said, and he didn't need to say so twice.

Now they just had to get past mama worm and outside before this place melted down. Or blew up.

They weren't fast enough to avoid everything; when Sam and Daniel were behind the row of machines again and Dean and Castiel had just reached the bottom of the stairs, one of the machines violently exploded, scattering debris right in their path. Dean yelled at Sam and Daniel to keep going, and he looked for another way around- but there was nothing clear except the path right alongside the worm, who was trying to work her way out of the hole, her head bumping into the rafters and lights and bringing chunks down to crash into the floor.

But not far beyond her, a machine was hissing steam and making an awful grinding noise, like it was about to blow- and Dean decided to gamble.

"Come on!" he yelled to Castiel, taking off in a sprint toward that machine. The mama worm caught sight of them- or however these worms spotted people, because Dean didn't see anything resembling eyes- and her head turned toward them, teeth dripping puddles of slime onto the floor.

They were so close. They had to make it.

Just as Dean grabbed Castiel and yanked him past the machine, the giant worm leaned forward and snapped her pinchers down- right on the overloaded machine. Luckily the blast was mostly muffled in her mouth, but Dean still felt a wave of heat, and the sound was enough to leave his ears ringing; though not as bad as the screech of pain from the worm.

He heard another blast behind them, and he dragged Castiel with him through the doors, Sam and Daniel waiting a short distance away. They started running again the moment they saw that Dean and Castiel had made it, and Dean pushed himself as fast as he could go, because that whole building was going to blow and they couldn't be anywhere near it when it did.

As it was, even almost to the outer fences was too close.

The explosion was massive, the shock wave shoving them forward and into the sand and shrubs. It was probably lucky that they got thrown down, because then debris was flying over their heads, and Dean covered his head with both hands, trying to ignore the pain in his ears from the blast.

And ew, that wasn't just debris and shrapnel, that was slimy chunks of worm landing around them.

He lifted his head when it seemed the worst of it was over, and the first thing he did was look for Castiel, but the angel seemed alright; a thin trail of blood dripped down from his ear, but Dean was pretty sure he was in the same shape, from the pain in his own. They both looked back at the smoking ruin left behind-

-and then a gold bracelet bounced off Dean's shoulder.

"What the hell?" he said, though his voice was muffled by his own ear injuries. He picked up the bracelet and looked closer- and then another bracelet landed. Then a plate. Then a few jewels.

It was fucking raining treasure.

It broke every law of physics that Dean had ever been familiar with, that underground treasure would be blasted into the sky from an explosion at ground level, but then again, he'd just finished running from giant acidic death worms. He really shouldn't have been surprised. It was karma for killing the queen of the worms, maybe; if he didn't know they wouldn't be staying in this reality, he may have snagged a couple pieces to pawn off.

As it was, the ringing in his ears was getting worse, and he saw Castiel wince too. He knew it was coming before it even happened; the world seemed to start spinning around them, and then total blackness set in.


End file.
